Stuttgart – Angelique Kerber is hoping the energy of the Stuttgart home crowd will help her turn around after her failed trip to Kazakhstan. Alexander Zverev struggled in his adopted home country with the next setback.
The top two German tennis pros are looking to put their difficult starts to the season behind them at the first tournaments of the year in Germany. Kerber faces the next tough task in her opening match against Estonian number five seed Anett Kontaveit in Stuttgart this week. “It’s sad, but you have to focus on the next thing quickly now. I’m happy to be here now,” the German number one said on Easter Monday.
“It’s disappointing “
Zverev first wants to cure his thigh blister in the coming days until his first appearance in Munich. “Things keep happening that are a little bit out of my control, which is annoying for me,” Zverev said after his clear two-set semi-final exit to tournament winner Stefanos Tsitsipas at the ATP Masters in Monte Carlo at the weekend. “It’s disappointing, now I have to try to regenerate again, which I’m starting to find a bit silly. In Miami I was sick, now I have a muscle injury. It’s not really going well yet this year.”
The world number three also confirmed to pay-TV channel Sky when asked that he would continue to compete next week in Munich (25 April to 1 May) and then at the tournaments in Madrid and Rome. It was already clear before his injury that Zverev would skip the clay court event in Barcelona around his 25th birthday on Wednesday.
After the most successful year of his career with six tournament victories including winning the Olympic gold medal in Tokyo 2021, Zverev is still waiting for his first major success this season. Among other things, he made headlines with his freak-out against an umpire in Acapulco. In the Principality, the Hamburg native was clearly beaten 4:6, 2:6 by the Greek Tsitsipas, who is currently outstanding on clay. “It is clear that the better player won. That my thigh played a role is also relatively clear,” said Zverev.
Kerber also looking for form
Kerber conceded tighter but no less annoying defeats in the German women’s tennis team’s 1-3 loss in the Billie Jean King Cup. The 34-year-old lost both her singles matches against the Kazakhs in three sets each, so that the German Tennis Federation selection will play against its first relegation in a decade in the competition, which was then called the Fed Cup, on 11/12 November.
On the way to the French Open in just over a month, Kerber now wants to get closer to her top form in Stuttgart. But the tournament, which she has won twice, threatens an early exit: the world number 17 will face Kontaveit in the first round. So far in her career, Kerber has only won one of her five matches against the 26-year-old. “The draws often don’t tell you much,” Kerber said, but of course she also knew it would not be an easy first round: “I know I have to play my best tennis from the beginning.”
Given the strong field with seven players in the current top ten, Kerber is an outsider. “It’s good for me that I already had two matches on the weekend. Maybe they will help me to get into the swing of things here now,” she said, also referring to her Stuttgart titles in 2015 and 2016: “It feels nice to be back, especially knowing that we’re playing in front of a crowd again. “