Alex de Minaur publicly calls for tennis to change after his shock French Open exit, 'the solution is simple'

Alex de Minaur was looking to reach his seventh consecutive Grand Slam third round.

The Australian star began his clay-court campaign with a stellar showing in Monte-Carlo, when De Minaur reached the semi-finals, narrowly coming up short against Lorenzo Musetti.

De Minaur’s form then took a downward turn, falling at the quarterfinal stage in Barcelona, before suffering two fourth-round defeats at the Madrid Open and Italian Open.

Looking to bounce back, the Aussie did just that in his French Open first-round match, beating Serbia’s Laslo Djere in straight sets, 6-3, 6-4, 7-6.

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It looked as though he’d secure another easy win in the second round when he led Alexander Bublik by two sets to love, before things quickly fell apart.

De Minaur lost to Bublik, 6-2, 6-2, 4-6, 3-6, 2-6, and called for the ATP Tour to make a structural change following his shock Roland Garros exit.

Alex de Minaur calls for the ATP Tour to ‘shorten the schedule’ and admits he’s feeling ‘burned out’

During his post-match press conference, De Minaur was asked whether he had any ideas on how to fix the crowded ATP Tour schedule.

“The solution is simple, you shorten the schedule,” he said.

De Minaur then explained why his schedule has been particularly busy over the past few years.

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“What’s not normal is that for the past three or four years, I’ve had two days off after Davis Cup and I’ve gone straight into pre-season and the new season,” he said.

“Yeah, sure, I could’ve taken a week or a week and a half [off], but then that means my pre-season is two weeks long, and I’m already starting in Australia, which is my home ground where I want to do well.

“Once you start, you don’t finish until November 24. It’s just never-ending. That’s the sheer fact of it.”

Norway’s Casper Ruud suffered a similarly shocking defeat in his second-round match, falling to Nuno Borges in four sets.

After the match, Ruud explained how the structure of the ATP Tour encourages players to compete, regardless of whether they are fit to do so.

“You feel you’re obligated to play with certain rules that the ATP has set up with the mandatory events. You feel like you lose a lot if you don’t show up and play, both economically, point-wise, ranking-wise, and opportunity-wise,” said Ruud.

“If you don’t play a mandatory event, they cut 25% of your year-end bonus. You’re kind of forcing players to show up injured or sick.”

De Minaur agreed with Ruud as he predicted what will happen to the length of players’ careers in the future.

“As Casper [Ruud] put it out there. I had to deal with that, I‘m still dealing with that right now. My ranking consists of two zeros because I was injured and I couldn’t play Cincinnati, Montreal, and Shanghai, [in 2024], which is ridiculous if you ask me, but that’s just the rules of the tour and where we are right now,” said De Minaur.

“The solution is you shorten it, because what’s going to happen is players’ careers are going to get shorter and shorter because they’re going to burn out mentally, it’s just too much tennis.”

The 26-year-old was keen, however, to take responsibility for the defeat and insists he’ll look for answers over how he let a two-set lead slip away.

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“There’s no excuse for today, myself, I need to look at myself in the mirror and find out the reasoning,” said De Minaur.

“One of those matches that just slip away, without a whole lot of meaning.

“I’m just tired, tired mentally, I’m a little bit burned out if anything, a lot of tennis being played.”

De Minaur described his defeat as a ‘miracle’ as he reflected on his impressive consistency over recent years.

“In a way, the good thing is that what happened today is something like a miracle, in the sense that I’m not known for these types of performances, for losing a match like this from two sets to love up,” he said.

“I’m probably known for the opposite, which is being consistent and not losing matches that I shouldn’t be losing.”

Alex de Minaur’s Grand Slam quarterfinal streak ends with shock French Open exit

Before losing to the Kazakh star in round two of the French Open, De Minaur had reached four consecutive Grand Slam quarterfinals.

That streak is now over, as the world number nine will now try to recover ahead of Wimbledon, the year’s next Grand Slam event.

De Minaur beat Frenchman Arthur Fils to reach the last eight at SW19 in 2024, but couldn’t take part in the quarterfinals due to a hip injury.

He’d no doubt love to bounce back from a tough loss in Paris by returning to the quarterfinals of Wimbledon in 2025.

The 2025 Wimbledon tournament is scheduled to begin on Monday, June 30.

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