Alexander Zverev: ‘You can become anything you want with…’

Registration for the 50th ABN AMRO Open is closed. At the last minute, some big names were added to the tournament, including Alexander Zverev and Grigor Dimitrov. With five players from the top-10 of the ATP Rankings and five former champions to start, the tournament has a very strong lineup. The 50th anniversary edition of the tournament will take place from February 11-19, 2023. Featuring Stefanos Tsitsipas, Andrey Rublev, Felix Auger-Aliassime, Daniil Medvedev and Holger Rune, five players from the top 10 of the ATP Rankings were previously announced. Former winners Andy Murray, Stan Wawrinka and Gaël Monfils were also on the list, as were Dutchmen Botic van de Zandschulp and Tim van Rijthoven. Today the entry closed, with five more players from the top 20 in the world: Hubert Hurkacz (11), Alexander Zverev (13), Pablo Carreño Busta (15), Jannik Sinner (16) and Karen Khachanov (20). Borna Coric, Alex de Minaur, Roberto Bautista Agut, Grigor Dimitrov, Daniel Evans, Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, Alexander Bublik, Maxime Cressy, Richard Gasquet, Emil Ruusuvuori and Lorenzo Sonego complete the provisional list. Tournament Director Richard Krajicek: “It’s the field we target every year. Lots of top 10 players, established names and young talent fighting for the title. With Rune, Sinner and Auger-Aliassime you have three of the best talents, where you can already see the latter -as defending champion- with the established order. The fact that, in addition to him, former champions Rublev, Wawrinka, Monfils and Murray are also present shows that there are many favorites for the title.” Especially interesting is the return of Alexander Zverev, who is back from a long injury and has just take back the racket. Krajicek: “It’s good news that Alexander Zverev is back on the court and coming to the ABN AMRO Open. In 2022 he seemed to be taking the last step towards the absolute top, but he was very unlucky with his injury.”

Zverev on Type-1 diabetes

Alexander Zverev opened up about playing tennis with Type-1 diabetes in a heartwarming interview with tennis presenter James Bracey. “You can have a normal life. You can become anything you want with this kind of illness. I want to play tennis and thats the only thing I really care about. ” Regarding the pessimistic approach of the doctors, he said: “This is what really stuck into my mind and it made me quite upset as well to be honest because I dont think you should set any limits for kids as it’s just not fair to them.”