Jack Draper will, and should, head into this year’s French Open brimming with optimism.
After all, he has been playing like a new man on the clay this year, reinvigorated and rising up the rankings too.
It is a testament to his hard work that the 23-year-old will arrive at Paris as the number five seed.
However, he has hardly been blessed because of this, with Jack Draper’s Roland Garros draw putting him on the half with Jannik Sinner, Novak Djokovic and Alexander Zverev.
Fortunately, these are all players that he should now feel more confident of beating than ever. Especially with the chance to make history.
Jack Draper could become the first British Roland Garros finalist since 2016
After all, shockingly, not a single British man has lifted the French Open since the Open Era began in the late 1960s.
Andy Murray naturally has come the closest in recent times, but unsurprisingly was thwarted by his old nemeses.
In reaching the final in 2016, the Scotsman had enjoyed a legendary run which culminated in a dramatic showdown against Djokovic. Despite taking the first set, he fell to a four-set defeat.
Other than that, Murray also reached four more semi-finals in Paris, failing in each of them.
Draper, free from the constraints that the Big Three imposed, will be hoping to emulate his compatriot’s historic 2016 run to the final.
Jack Draper’s record at the French Open
And there’s no reason to believe that he can’t achieve this feat either, especially after his strong clay-court season.
An early exit in Monte-Carlo denoted a poor start, but he followed that up with a run to the Madrid Open final where he only lost in three sets to Casper Ruud.
Even in Rome, he was only overcome by the eventual champion Carlos Alcaraz in a narrow, hard-fought affair.
Historically, though, Draper has not enjoyed the best of times in Paris. In fact, he has actually never made it past the first round.
That is surely set to change during this campaign, and whilst having to likely bypass two of Sinner, Djokovic or Zverev just to reach the final is frustrating, he would have had to face them eventually.
Each of these superstars are not the formidable force they once were, and Draper should feel confident of upsetting the status quo and returning British tennis back to the pinnacle where Murray had kept it for so long.
