ATP Rankings (16/09/24): Brit continues rise in Davis Cup dominated week

This past week has been dominated by Davis Cup action, while the Challenger Tour has been impacting the ATP rankings.

After the US Open concluded, attention turned towards the Davis Cup that has not offered any ranking points since 2016.

This means that the latest update in the ATP rankings has been exclusively impacted by Challenger results in Szczecin (Poland), Guangzhou (China), Rennes (France), Las Vegas (USA) and Dobrich (Bulgaria).

Big Movers

There has been little movement towards the very top of the ATP rankings this week, with Australian Christopher O’Connell the biggest upward mover inside the top 100.

After reaching the third round of the US Open for the first time, O’Connell claimed the sixth Challenger title of his career in Guangzhou.

As a result of beating Sho Shimabukuro in the final, O’Connell has risen 12 places upto World No.75.

Mood 🙌

Christopher O’Connell claims his 6th career Challenger title#ATPChallenger | @TennisAustralia pic.twitter.com/1fHQYlEQyQ

— ATP Challenger Tour (@ATPChallenger) September 15, 2024

Another of the title winners this week is the continuously rising Jacob Fearnley, who claimed victory in Rennes after beating exclusively French players.

At the start of the year Fearnley was ranked outside the world’s top 600, but after winning three Challenger titles the Scotsman is now approaching the top 100.

And he had to do it the hard way in Rennes, after losing the first set in 20 minutes and saving two match points to beat Quentin Halys in the final.

Fearnley Reigns in Rennes 👑

The Brit saves two championship points and defeats Halys 0-6, 7-6(5), 6-3 to claim the @OpenBlotRennes title!#ATPChallenger | @jakefearnley01 pic.twitter.com/XPn733ejd0

— ATP Challenger Tour (@ATPChallenger) September 15, 2024

Fearnley, who is the British No.4, is now at a career-high of No.129 after climbing a further 35 places.

Some of the other significant upward movers this week are the aforementioned Halys (+10 to No.98), Constant Lestienne (+6 to No.103), Mikhail Kukushkin (+8 to No.112), Harold Mayot (+9 to No.118), Vit Kopriva (+10 to No.133), Andrea Pellegrino (+31 to No.144), Learner Tien (+42 to No.151), Sho Shimabukuro (+31 to No.165), Abdullah Shelbayh (+11 to No.193) and Tristan Boyer (+31 to No.200).

It was not such a good week in terms of ranking for Federico Coria, who was the defending champion at the Szczecin Challenger tournament.

Despite producing some better results on the Polish clay, Coria was beaten in the semi-finals by eventual champion Vit Kopriva, the same player he beat in last year’s final.

KOPRIVA THE FIGHTER 🥊

The Czech saves FIVE match points and defeats Coria 5-7, 7-5, 7-6(4) to reach the final in Szczecin!#ATPChallenger | @szczecinopen pic.twitter.com/VLBgVo78MQ

— ATP Challenger Tour (@ATPChallenger) September 14, 2024

Consequently, Coria drops 90 points from his ranking and falls 14 places down the rankings to World No.93.

Shortly after winning his first ATP title in Newport back in 2022, Maxime Cressy rose to a career-high ranking of World No.31 and was actually seed at the US Open that year.

However, things have not been so great for Cressy since, who has suffered another setback this week after losing 95 points from winning the Rennes Challenger title last year.

Cressy actually elected not to defend his title and headed to Guangzhou instead, where he lost in the first round. The 27-year-old has now fallen 52 places down to World No.212.

Coria and Cressy are not the only fallers of note, with Mariano Navone (-4 to No.40), Francisco Comesana (-9 to No.100), Mattia Bellucci (-6 to No.108), Yunchaokete Bu (-11 to No.124), Zachary Svajda (-23 to No.135), Oriol Roca Batalla (-11 to No.161), Terence Atmane (-26 to No.164), Benjamin Bonzi (-27 to No.180) and Patrick Kypson (-18 to No.186) also suffering noteworthy drops.

ATP Rankings Top 20 (16/09/24)

The top 20 in the ATP rankings remains completely unchanged this week:

For a full list of the rankings, visit the official ATP website

Race to the ATP Finals in Turin (16/09/24)

The ATP Finals are a highly anticipated event that take place at the end of each year, featuring the top eight singles players and doubles teams from the tennis season.

With none of the top players earning any ranking points this week, the race to the ATP Finals in Turin also remains unchanged with three players having confirmed their qualification:

1. Jannik Sinner – 9000 points (Qualified)

2. Alexander Zverev – 6115 points (Qualified)

3. Carlos Alcaraz – 6010 points (Qualified)

4. Daniil Medvedev – 4420 points

5. Taylor Fritz – 3890 points

6. Casper Ruud – 3795 points

7. Andrey Rublev – 3480 points

8. Alex de Minaur  – 3305 points

9. Novak Djokovic – 3260 points

10. Grigor Dimitrov – 2835 points

Next week

Main tour action is back this week, with two ATP 250 events in Chengdu and Hangzhou.

Chengdu features the likes of Lorenzo Musetti, Alexander Bublik and Nicolas Jarry, with former World No.4 Kei Nishikori continuing his comeback as a wildcard.

While Hangzhou is making its debut on the ATP Tour, featuring Holger Rune, Karen Khachanov, Tomas Martin Etcheverry and Brandon Nakashima as the top four seeds.

Chengdu & Hangzhou Top seeds 🔥@ChengduOpen pic.twitter.com/lFqvUXjWYD

— ATP Tour (@atptour) September 16, 2024

Not only that, but there is also the small matter of the Laver Cup to contend with, as Team Europe take on Team World in Berlin.

Carlos Alcaraz will be making his debut at the event this year, as he takes on a Team World side led by US Open finalist Taylor Fritz.

READ MORE – Tennis on TV Next Week: How to watch the Laver Cup, WTA Seoul and much more!

ATP Rankings rules

ATP rankings track and rank all the players on tour over a 52-week period. Points are awarded for performance, with the biggest tournaments giving out the most points over the course of the year.

Those rankings are then used to determine a number of things, such as seedings at tournaments and deciding who qualifies for the season-ending ATP Finals in Turin.

ATP rankings points awarded/tournament

The following points are awarded for the different tiers of tournaments on the ATP Tour, with some slight alterations made for the 2024 season:

Admissible tournaments

To prevent players from manipulating the rankings by playing a large amount of smaller tournaments, only 19 tournaments are admissible over the course of the year to make up a ranking.

That number does not include the ATP Finals, with that treated as an extra earned opportunity to win rankings points. However, the bigger and most prestigious tournaments are considered ‘mandatory’ entries. For example, if a player lost in round one of a Grand Slam, they would not be permitted to omit it from their ranking in favour of an ATP 250 which earned them more points.

Therefore, players who compete at all the mandatory events in a season will have the following breakdown of admissible rankings points:

• 4 Grand Slams
• 8 Masters 1000
• 7 ‘Best Other’ performances

The rankings always cover the previous 52-week period, so any points won further back than that are deducted from a player’s total. That player will, though, have the chance to ‘defend’ their points by repeating or improving upon their previous performance.

An example would be a player who was a defeated finalist at the Australian Open in 2024 will have 1300 points deducted from their ranking following the 2025 final. Those points would then be replaced by those won at the 2025 tournament.

READ NEXT: Lleyton Hewitt slams ‘stupid’ Davis Cup Finals format

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