De Minaur after his UTS triumph : “My game suits up quite well”
The Demon, UTS champion for the second year in a row, talked about the strengths that make him a perfect fit for the UTS format.
Alex de Minaur – UTS Grand Final 2025 © UTS Tour
Only one quarter loss today in the final for you. You found your perfect rhythm and pace at the best moment. Is that what you felt also?
Alex de Minaur : It felt great. After a tough match against Andrey Rublev (loss in round robin), I kind of went back to the drawing board and tweaked a couple things. I felt like I brought up my level and played some incredible tennis for the remaining three matches. It was exactly what I needed to lift the title here again in London.
What changed? Was it the mindset? The tactical choice?
It was a bit of the mindset, kind of be nicer to myself. Ultimately, it’s still pre-season. I can’t get too angry when I make mistakes and too frustrated. I felt like as the days went on, I played better and better and found my level.
Three crowns in career at UTS (Antwerp 2020, London 2024, London 2025). You are the ultimate specialist. Why?
I guess my game suits us quite well. I think it’s just one serve, being quite consistent. Very fast paced, energetic. I back my fitness and all these kind of things together make me a tough competitor. That’s definitely helped me out in UTS competitions. I do my best not to give too many cheap points away and ultimately, physically, I’m feeling great.
Casper (Ruud) was talking about you almost painting the lines, going really close to them. Was that the plan to go super deep and really push Casper as much as possible?
That’s always the plan. It’s not too easy to execute, but ultimately the game plan was to try to play on my terms and try to dictate as much as I can. With someone like Casper, you don’t want to give him too much time, because when he’s got time, he can really hurt you with his forehand. That was the mindset to go after the ball. If I had a short ball, just commit. I’m glad that it worked out.
Two years in a row now in London. Is there an element like it’s your second home, that’s why you do well here maybe?
I love coming back here. It’s a great energy, atmosphere. As I said a couple of the nights I’m staying at home and I’m just going out and enjoying what London has to offer. It’s been a great weekend here in London and it’s always great to be here. I play pretty well on this court so I can’t complain.
Can we expect a massive performance in London at Wimbledon in 2026?
I’ll tell you what I would love nothing more than to come back at Wimbledon and have a great result there. That’s definitely one of my favorite tournaments of the year and one that I definitely prioritize. Hopefully 2026 will be will be a good year for me.
ONE SERVE ON THE TOUR? It would definitely match my play style a lot
How’s the physical shape? Remember that you couldn’t play in Hong Kong. How’s the hip? How is everything? What are your plans for the rest of the off season?
The hip and everything, it’s getting better. It’s still a long progress. It’s something that I’m managing. This is why we got the preseason. I can hopefully build the body up and make sure that I start 2026 in full force. Keep training, keep working. Monday off and Tuesday I’m back to work. I’m sure I’ll have a couple track sessions and long sessions on court and gym. This is our time to keep on improving and keep working on yourself. The whole goal is to make sure I’m ready to go for 2026.
I just wondered if you’ve ever imagined a world where there’s only one serve across all matches in the tour. I never thought quite how good you could be.
It would definitely match my play style a lot. I’m not gonna lie. It eliminates essentially the serve bots and it becomes just a baseline game where I think I would have a lot of success and probably the reason why I have a lot of success here at UTS. I don’t think we’ll ever get to that stage, sadly. I don’t think a lot of people would have my back. Definitely not the serve bots. Especially now that is such a huge part of the game. The only thing I can do is go out there and and improve my serve.
