After his best year on tour, Newcombe Medal nominee Alex de Minaur is in contention to win the coveted award for a second time.
Melbourne, Australia , 4 December 2023 | Dan Imhoff
Top-ranked Australian Alex de Minaur is knocking on the door of the top 10 following his finest season to date.
The 24-year-old opened 2023 representing Australia at the United Cup, where he secured his biggest career win over then-world No.2 Rafael Nadal before his home crowd in Sydney.
It was his first of six top-10 wins in 2023, a marked improvement having previously claimed seven in total from 2017-2022.
De Minaur notched his second straight Australian Open fourth-round showing in January โ the first Aussie man to achieve the feat since 2016 โ before he fell to eventual champion Novak Djokovic.
His hard-court form carried to Acapulco in March, when he denied Holger Rune and Tommy Paul back-to-back for his seventh tour title, his first at ATP 500 level.
It was his first of four finals for the season.
De Minaur also finished runner-up to Carlos Alcaraz at Queenโs Club in June and to Stefanos Tsitsipas at Los Cabos in August before his first ATP Masters 1000 final at Toronto, where his victims included top-10 rivals Taylor Fritz and Daniil Medvedev before Jannik Sinner ended his run.
โLooking at the results, Iโm pretty happy with where my level is at and how Iโm continuously chipping away towards my goals,โ De Minaur said following the final. โStep by step, I feel like Iโm getting better. Iโm showing my level against top opponents, day in and day out.
โAnd this week was a great week for me. Iโm feeling confident. Still got areas which I need to improve on, and I think itโs going to be the case my whole career, but thatโs the beauty of it.โ
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It paved the way for his third run to the round of 16 at the US Open three weeks later and by October he inched up a spot to world No.11 to become the highest-ranked Australian man since his mentor Lleyton Hewitt 17 years ago.
โIโm going to push every single ounce that Iโve got in my body, in myself, to get to the best level that I can,โ De Minaur said.
โIโll be very happy once Iโm retired and Iโm sitting on my couch, and Iโll be able to look at my career and say, โYou know what? I achieved great things just by pure hard work and determinationโ.โ
That unwavering resolve was on display when De…
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