This season Dominic Thiem takes to the court in Melbourne as one of the favourites to win a Grand Slam title after his breakthrough in 2020.
Last year at the US Open the Austrian clinched his maiden major trophy after outlasting Alexander Zverev in a marathon five-set final. The triumph occurred during the year in which he also finished runner-up at the Australian Open and ATP Finals in London. Those successes enabled Thiem to end the year at No.3 in the world for the first time in his career.
Although the 27-year-old acknowledges that there is ‘no guarantee’ that he will be able reproduce his previous successes on the Tour. Thiem has played in 28 ATP finals since 2014 with four of those occurring at Grand Slam tournaments.
“I will try to repeat the success of 2020 and also 2019,” Thiem said during a press conference in Melbourne on Monday. “They were amazing years but there’s never a guarantee for that (to happen again).’
“In a Grand Slam tournament or ATP Cup, all the big tournaments, the whole draw is super strong, so there is never a guarantee to go deep or to win a title.’
“I’ll try everything to do it. I had, again, quite a good preparation.”
Another dimension Thiem will have to contend with is playing in front of fans again and coping with the pressure related to that. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic many tournaments, including the US Open, had to be held behind closed doors. However, Australia is able to open up their events to the public thanks to their rigorous measures in combating the pandemic. The Australian Open is set to welcome up to 30,000 fans per day which is 50% of the usual capacity.
Like many of his peers, Thiem is relishing the return of a crowd to the sport. Although he admits that it will take him a while to get used to it again.
“It was very, very strange to play in the huge stadiums without a crowd but then I got used to it,” he explains.
“It was never that fun because I had the feeling, especially in London, there were matches with a very high level of tennis, just no crowd, so it was super strange. But playing-wise, I got used to it.’
“The same will be here if there’s a crowd again. It will probably take some games or half an hour, hour, to get used to it again because it is different with all the sound.”
Thiem returns to the court on Tuesday where he will lead Austria in the ATP Cup. The team is captained by his father Wolfgang with other members being Dennis Novak, Philipp Oswald and Tristan-Samuel Weissborn. Last year Austria finished last in their Group.
Hoping to improve this time round, Thiem opens up against Matteo Berrettini in what could prove to be a difficult encounter for him. Historically he has struggled against the Italian world No.10 with their head-to-head level at 2-2. Their last meeting was at the 2019 ATP Finals which Berrettini won in straight sets.
“We have a very good relationship, always fun matches against each other,” Thiem said of his upcoming opponent. “But he’s a big, big player, so I’m also not too happy that he’s the first guy I have to face in a new year after quite a while without an official match.”
Besides Italy, Austria will also play France later in the week.
