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Jack Draper believes his recent breakthrough on clay, a surface he is still finding his feet, has positioned him well for a potential deep run at the French Open as he seeks his first career win in Paris.
“With the way I’m playing, the fact that I’ve really improved a lot recently and my ranking is going up and I feel confident, I think there’s a good chance I can do really well,” said Britain’s world No 5. “I’m looking forward to that challenge.”
Six weeks ago, Draper began the clay court season merely hoping for his first significant gains on the surface. He has exceeded expectations, reaching his first clay-court final at the Madrid Open before following it up with a run to the quarter-finals of the Italian Open. For the first time, he is a top-five player at a grand slam tournament.
In hindsight, Draper’s messy five-set first round defeat by Jesper de Jong in Paris last year proved to be a necessary setback and one of the most important moments in his journey towards the top of the game. While his prior issues had revolved around his physical condition, that defeat forced him to make significant changes to his mentality and approach. In his next tournament, he won his long-awaited first ATP title in Stuttgart, a victory that set the tone for his subsequent results.
“One year ago, and I think: ‘Wow,’ like how much I’ve learned through experience, but also the fact that I didn’t really understand my DNA as a tennis player, what I was trying to do on the court,” he said. “Whereas now, obviously a lot more to come. I have a real good understanding and a good base of what I’m trying to do. That’s helped me achieve a lot of success, because I feel pretty confident when I go out on to the match court. Very proud of the way I’ve come in the last 12 months. I think that’s a testament to the hard work I’ve done, the people I’ve got around me.”
After four consecutive weeks of competition, Draper used the brief time between Rome and Paris to relax with his family and briefly pause before the second grand slam of the year. His rise has naturally come with more attention and scrutiny, but also more opportunities. He recently became a Burberry ambassador, leading a commercial campaign with the prominent model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley after shooting the campaign in Dubai. “She was lovely. She was really down to earth, really kind. For someone who hasn’t been on many of those things before I was sort of: ‘What’s going on?’ but she made me feel very comfortable,” he said.
“The whole campaign was really cool. There was a photo of us jumping out [into the Persian Gulf]. She’s smiling, I’m not. I don’t think I got the memo. I think she made me look good.”
Despite his growing profile, and the widespread belief that he is capable of competing for the biggest titles, Draper says life has not changed too much off the court and he still navigates south London without any attention. “In the UK, I haven’t had that at all,” he said.
“When I’m off the court, I’m quite low key. I wear baggy stuff and I’ve always had my hat on on-court. Certainly small things: this week I had the haircut thing. I’ve had the same shocking haircut since I was 14 and everyone’s saying I’ve got a new haircut, [but] it’s the same one I’ve always had. So it’s nothing new. It’s just more people have [only] known me the last four months.”
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Elsewhere, the British No 1 Katie Boulter is also seeking her first victory at Roland Garros after winning her first clay court tournament at the Paris WTA 125 event last week.
“Sometimes playing the lower-ranked events are really good, then you can kind of gain a bit of confidence with them,” she said. “I am a bit of a confidence player, so I feel like I need that sometimes. I was very happy to step down and play that tournament. I had no expectations going into it. Obviously I think it helped and it worked.”
