Holger Rune is working hard in this period to return to play his best tennis with the right consistency and some signs have already been seen, although the young Danish star is still far from the level of champions such as Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz.
He was considered at the same level as the Italian and the Spaniard until a few seasons ago, but several problems have prevented him from growing as expected and he has definitely moved away from the top of the men's tour.
The former world No.4 has also shown flashes of his enormous talent in the first half of this season, reaching the final at the Indian Wells Masters 1000 and lifting the trophy at the Barcelona ATP 500 (after defeating Carlitos Alcaraz in the final), but he has had numerous ups and downs and his body tends to suffer too many injuries for a player of his age.
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Rune is getting better
Before the start of the Washington ATP 500, Rune worked for a few days with American legend Andre Agassi who is not destined to become his coach but they have stayed in touch and it seems that the advice of the former world No.1 is useful to the Danish star.
It was reasonable to expect something more from Holger at the Toronto Masters 1000, but he is playing excellent tennis in Cincinnati so far and eliminated a really dangerous player like Alex Michelsen in the third round.
Speaking on 'Tennis Channel', the former Top 5 player revealed that he thought of Andy Murray during his match against Michelsen: I thought I made a lot of returns today. I dont know the stats but I think that automatically puts more pressure on a guy like Alex as well.
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I actually thought a little bit about Andy Murray because I was like he makes so many returns and its actually better to make a little dirty chip on the service line than to miss it, you know, and going for something. So thats what I thought about, yeah.
Rune will face local idol Frances Tiafoe in the next round.
