ATP Rankings Report – As of Oct. 21, 2024

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With THREE ATP Tour events on tap, and many excellent players away playing for paydays at the UTS and the 6 Kings Slam, there was more opportunity than you could shake a racquet at last week on the ATP Tour.

And the big winners were Tommy Paul in Stockholm, a resurgent Roberto Bautista Agut in Antwerp and Karen Khachanov in Almaty.

Khachanov overcame a dogged young Canadian, Gabriel Diallo, in the final.

The three defending champions from a year ago – Ben Shelton in Tokyo, Gaël Monfils in Stockholm and Alexander Bublik in Antwerp – all chose to pass on defending their titles and/or their points and played the exhibtion UTS instead or, in Bublik’s case, passed on his “home-country” tournament.

WTA Rankings Report – As of Oct. 21, 2024

For the complete ATP Tour rankings update for Monday, click here.

Felix Auger-Aliassime (CAN): No. 21 ===========> No. 19 (Auger-Aliassime moved back inside the top 20, despite only making the quarterfinals in Antwerp and dropping the quarterfinal points from a bigger event in Tokyo a year ago. That mostly had to do with Ben Shelton and Arthur Fils dropping points this week. He heads to Basel, where he’s defending 500 more).

Karen Khachanov (RUS): No. 26 ===========> No. 24 (Khachanov has been quiet this season. But he’s more or less maintaining his ranking and adds to his title collection with a trophy in Almaty (and a new outfit). He now has to quickly commute to play in Vienna in a day or two).

Jiri Lehecka (CZE): No. 33 ===========> No. 28 (Lehecka’s star was soaring until he came down with back problems in the spring. Things look better now, and he moves back into the top 30 by making the Antwerp final).

Roberto Bautista Agut (ESP): No. 60 ===========> No. 45 (The former No. 9, now 36, has had a long road back from injury and in Antwerp, he wins his first title since July 2022. He’s in Basel this week).

Aleksandar Vukic (AUS): No. 85 ===========> No. 72 (Vukic, 28, made the Almaty semifinals. He’s back on the Challenger circuit in Taipei this week).

Gabriel Diallo (CAN): No. 118 ===========> No. 87 (Diallo has had some disappointments in Grand Slam qualifying. So it’s good to know that he likely won’t have to deal with that going forward. Diallo, who made his first ATP Tour final in Almaty, leaps into the top 100 for the first time in his career).

Mackenzie McDonald (USA): No. 137 ===========> No. 120 (McDonald wins the Challenger in Shenzhen, and puts a dent in a ranking that’s fallen a fair bit from his career best of No. 37 exactly a year ago).

Martin Landaluce (ESP): No. 232 ===========> No. 158 (The 18-year-old was already at a career high. But with his title at the Olbia Challenger, he leaps into the top 200 for the first time, by a fair margin. The Spanish just keep them coming on the men’s side).

Tristan Boyer (USA): No. 215 ===========> No. 159 (Boyer, a former Stanford Cardinal, is 23 now and wins on clay down at Campinas, as he tries to slay the South American fall Challenger circuit. It’s a career best by a long ways).

Daniel Evans (GBR): No. 180 ===========> No. 161 (The entertaining Brit is slowly chipping away at his tumbled ranking, getting through the qualifying and winning a round in Almaty).

Stan Wawrinka (SUI): No. 217 ===========> No. 169 (The 39-year-old showed so many flashes of his vintage form last week in Stockholm that he found himself in the semifinals. Impressive work. He has a wild card into Basel in his home country this week, and is back in the top 200).

Liam Draxl (CAN): No. 272 ===========> No. 233 (The 22-year-old Canaian is at a new career high after winning the $25K ITFin Edmonton, and making the semis at the larger Calgary Challenger this past weekend. He also won the doubles. He’s at another Challenger in Sioux Falls (that’s South Dakota) this week and you’d think he could get into the qualifying at the Australian Open. Which would be a first in his career).

Murphy Cassone (USA): No. 599 ===========> No. 363 (The unknown Cassone, taking a semester from schol to play the fall Challengers, maximizes by going from the qualifying to the title at the Calgary Challenger. Along the way, he defeated local favorite Alexis Galarneau in a quarterfinal that took three hours, 42 minutes and featured five MTOs. Needless to say, it’s a career high).

Vasek Pospisil (CAN): No. 774 ===========> No. 727 (Pospisil won his first match since April in the first round of the Calgary Challenger, and that was worth some 40 spots in the rankings, given where he is at the moment).

Kimmer Coppejans (BEL): No. 905 ===========> No. 748 (The 30-year-old former top-100 player and 2012 Roland Garros junior champion is starting over at the bottom after a long injury absence. He makes a dent in it with back-to-back wins in Monastir at entry-level Futures tournaments).

Ben Shelton (USA): No. 17 ===========> No. 23 (Once the 22-year-old broke into the top 20, you wouldn’t have thought he’d leave it for awhile. But he didn’t play last week because of UTS. And the points he earned for winning Tokyo a year ago drop off. Perhaps the $$ were worth it; he’s only 80 points from getting right back in).

Alexander Bublik (KAZ): No. 28 ===========> No. 32 (Bublik took a pass on the ATP 250 in his adopted home country of Kazakhstan this week, also to play UTS. And he drops all the points from his title in Antwerp and drops out of the top 30. He’s in Basel this week).

Gael Monfils (FRA: No. 41 ===========> No. 52 (Another player who chose UTS last week, Monfils was defending his Stockholm title, so those points go by the boards. He is back on tour in Vienna this week).

Pavel Kotov (RUS): No. 59 ===========> No. 75 (Kotov, who lost in the first round in Stockholm, drops his points from making the final a year ago. He also lost in the first round of qualifying in Vienna, so he can’t make up any ground this week).

***Thiem and Zverev played an exhibition Sunday in Vienna, ahead of Thiem’s career finale this week. (Photo: Mutua Madrid Open/Ángel Martínez)***

Dominic Thiem (AUT): No. 289 ===========> No. 318 (Thiem’s ranking briefly rose into the top 100 on the ATP site, when they credited his exhibition finale match against Alexander Zverev as the … final of Vienna. But that was a mirage. He has a wild card into the final tournament if his career, which he’s playing without having competed much in the last many months. He faces the Italian Luciano Darderi).

Aslan Karatsev (RUS): No. 139 ===========> No. 316 (That one is going to hurt for Kasatsev, a former No. 14 who is still only 31. He qualified and won a round in Almaty. But that didn’t even come close to making up for the points he was defending from making the final in Tokyo a year ago. He’s outside the top 300 – a year to forget after he had to undergo knee surgery after the first event of the year in Brisbane. Let’s see where he goes from here, because that’s a tough rankings section to try to get into the bigger tournaments).

Diego Schwartzman (ARG): No. 302 ===========> No. 369 (Schwartzman isn’t playing at the moment, really just biding his time until his official retirement at home at the ATP Tour event in Buenos Aires event early next year).

Jack Draper (GBR) (No. 18)
Shang Juncheng (CHN) (No. 47)
Zizou Bergs (BEL) (No. 65)
Alexandre Muller (FRA) (No. 68)
Gabriel Diallo (CAN) (No. 87)
Jacob Fearnley (GBR) (No. 92)
Jerôme Kym (SUI) (No. 140)
Jaime Faria (POR) (No. 144)
Joao Fonseca (BRA) (No. 154)
Martin Landaluce (ESP) (No. 158)
Tristan Boyer (USA) (No. 159)

(There’s an error in there that they haven’t corrected yet, as they gave Alexander Zverev points for a “loss” to Dominic Thiem in Vienna – in an exhibition career finale. It doesn’t change the standings, though).