WITH all the ATP Tour and WTA Tour tournaments on hiatus for the time being, Draft Central will take a look at various nations across the globe and analyse how the top players from that nation are performing. Our next nation is Cyprus.

Top ATP player: Petros Chrysochos
Rank: 418 (as of March 16, 2020)
Age: 23
Points: 84
Tournaments played: 14

Twelve months ago it would have been fairly obvious who the top Cypriot was in the world. After a couple of stunning Australian Open runs, Marcos Baghdatis became endeared to most of the tennis world. While his career might not have ended up as successful as it first looked, he still forged a really respectable one over more than a decade. Now retired, he is no longer on the ATP Tour, and instead the top ranking Cypriot is Petros Chrysochos. He is 23-years-old and has played the 14 tournaments in the past 12 months, sitting inside the top 500 after moving up 61 spots in the latest update back in early March. A recently turned professional just last year, he actually has a bit of underdog status about him.

His consistency is still a way off, but he won the most recent event, an 25K event in Las Vegas to shoot his way up to his current ranking, picking up $3600 USD in the process. It followed on from three first round losses in the past four starts, though a semi-finals appearance in Tunisia late in January helped his ranking too. Unlike many others around his ranking, the 23-year-old has actually played in ATP Tour events, such as Winston-Salem last year where he fought hard but lost in the second round of qualifying to Bjorn Fratangelo in three sets. He seems far too good on the American ITF circuit, and looks a good choice for someone who will continue at the Challenger level for a year or so once it returns, and try and make main draws in the United States’ hard court circuit.

Other notable Cyprus ATP players: Sergis Kyratzis (#eq. 1782nd)

—

Top WTA player: Raluka Serban
Rank: 341 (as of 23/03/2020)
Age: 22
Points: 147
Tournaments played: 20

Unlike her ATP Tour counterpart, Serban does not have as greater shoes to fill with a retirement, but she is higher ranked – at 341st in the world – and already competing in higher ranked ITF tournaments. She attends the majors each year which shows she intends on travelling the world where feasible, and this stacks up with her 20 tournaments over the past year. Whilst she is yet to defeat a top 100 player, she has pushed a number of opponents on her day, and has fought through qualifying to reach main draws of ITF tournaments.

In the past, she has taken Eugenie Bouchard to three sets – in Luxembourg, 2018 – and reached a number of ITF finals including winning in Istanbul the very next tournament where she claimed a win over Serbia’s Nina Stojanovic. In her most recent tournaments, Serban has played in France – where she unfortunately ran into top 100 talent Arantxa Rus in the Round of 16 and was smacked 6-1 6-0, and then bounced back to reach a quarter final in the Slovak Republic before a tight three-set loss to Victoria Kan.

Other notable Cyprus WTA players: Nil.
—

Summary:

Cyprus has a couple of underrated talents who might show some promising signs in the future and you could expect to see them battling it out on the Challenger Tour soon. They have credentials to achieve well there, and in time, will be ones to watch given they are young and recently more professional.