WITH no live tennis on currently due to the COVID-19 global pandemic, Draft Central will take a look back at some of the best players of past and present and rank them based on a specific set of guidelines. In our first Top 10 countdown, we look at the Top 10 ATP Players to never have won a Grand Slam title, moving onto number five who retired just last year after a stellar career sharing the spoils amongst some of the tour’s greatest names before injury curtained his last few seasons.

#5 Tomas Berdych (982 matches – 65.2% winning record, 13 career titles, #4 career-high ranking)

Moving into the top five, it is another recent player on the ATP Tour who only announced his retirement last year. He had an up-and-down career at times, but still managed to play an impressive 982 matches with a 65.2 per cent winning record. He did reach fourth in an era when the top three were virtually untouchable, and he was often battling the likes of Andy Murray and David Ferrer for the other top five spots. Berdych churned out a 17-year career and in that time won almost $30 million USD in prize money as well as claiming 13 titles. Berdych won three titles at Stockholm and two at Shenzhen, and his last came in 2016, whilst still ranked inside the top 10.

It takes more than just a solid player to remain inside the top 10 for 286 consecutive weeks, from June, 2010 until slipping to 11th at the end of October, 2016. January, 2017 would be his last time inside the top 10, and with his career coming to an end, it is worth remembering just what he achieved. He was most comfortable on hard court with nine of his titles coming on the surface, while being one of the few really strong grass court players. He was still solid on clay, winning a couple of titles, but his overall Grand Slam record of 70.5 per cent is one to be proud of. He might not have won a Grand Slam, but he reached the final at Wimbledon in 2010, as well as four ATP Masters 1000 finals, winning one. With 19 career finals to accompany his 13 titles, he was there at the top of his game the past decade, and even made the final in Doha last year.

Berdych was unlucky not to take out the Wimbledon title because the Czech ran into the ‘Big Three’. He got past Roger Federer in the quarter finals, winning 6-4 3-6 6-1 6-4, then defeated Novak Djokovic in straight sets in the semis. His form ran out there though, going down to Rafael Nadal in the final, 6-3 7-5 6-4. While he was not to eventually win a Grand Slam title, he would repeatedly make the ATP Tour Finals, and led the Czech Republic to its first Davis Cup title since 1980 in 2012, winning six of seven singles and teaming up for an unbeaten four games with Radek Stepanek. He backed up the 2012 Davis Cup title with back-to-back titles a year later, defeating Serbia in the final and played the longest Davis Cup match in history, with his doubles against Switzerland in the first round going to 24-22 in the fifth to win.

In 2015, Berdych achieved his career-high fourth with a final at the ATP Masters 1000 in Rome, losing to Federer, also reaching his sixth straight ATP World Tour Finals. Unfortunately 2016 marked his decline after having to withdraw from Washington with fatigue and then the US Open with appendicitis. The next year he had to withdraw from Montreal due to a rib injury and then also copped a shoulder injury and then a season-ending back injury. He never quite got back to the top level with regular back and hip injuries ultimately ending his career for him. His last match was a four-set loss to lowly ranked Jenson Brooksby in New York last year, ultimately giving himself the indication that his career was over. It was not one to forget however, as Berdych will go down as the greatest male Czech player in history to-date.

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Top 10 ATP Players without a Grand Slam title:

#10 Wojciech Fibak (Poland)
#9 Fernando Gonzales (Chile)
#8 Tim Henman (Great Britain)
#7 Robin Soderling (Sweden)
#6 David Nalbandian (Argentina)
#5 Tomas Berdych (Czech Republic)