Casper Ruud


Casper Ruud is a Norwegian professional tennis player from Snarøya in Bærum.

Career

Right-handed Ruud grew up with Rafael Nadal as his tennis idol.

Junior Tennis

Ruud reached the third round of the 2015 French Open boys' singles event, losing to Corentin Denolly. He also reached the third round of the 2015 US Open boys' singles and the second round of the 2015 Wimbledon boys' singles, making it his best singles performances in the respective competitions in Junior Grand Slams during his Junior career.
In the 2015 Wimbledon Boys' Doubles, Ruud made it to the semi-finals together with partner Miomir Kecmanović, before losing out to Lý Hoàng Nam and Sumit Nagal who went on to win the tournament. They got knocked-out in the first round of the 2015 US Open Boys' Doubles. In 2016, Ruud and Kecmanović reached the semi-finals of the 2016 French Open Boys' Doubles before getting knocked-out by Youssef Hossam and Jurabek Karimov.

2016: Climbing the rankings and first ATP Challenger win

Ruud started the year by being the no. 1 ranked Junior player on January 4, making him the first Norwegian to do so.
For the 2016 season, Ruud set his goals on playing Futures tournaments to play more senior tennis and start climbing the ATP Rankings. In February, he played his first Futures final, a final he ended up winning against Carlos Taberner in Paguera, Spain.
He has since played four more finals, winning one of them against Mikael Torpegaard in Kaarina, Finland in August.
In September, 2016, in his first ever ATP Challenger tournament, Ruud managed to win the Copa Sevilla after beating Taro Daniel in the final. By winning on his debut Ruud became the fourth-youngest to ever do so. In the tournament, he recorded his first wins over players ranked in the top 150. He knocked-out the top seed Iñigo Cervantes in the quarter-final, who at the time was ranked no. 75 on the ATP Rankings. Due to his win in his Challenger debut, Ruud received a wildcard to the 2016 Chengdu Open, his first ATP World Tour 250 series tournament. Ruud lost to Viktor Troicki 6–3, 7–6 in the first round.
Ruud also qualified for the ITF Junior Masters, where he reached the final, losing to Hong Seong-chan.
Ruud finished 2016 with a career high ranking of 225 on the ATP Ranking.

2017: ATP 500 semi-final and ATP Masters 1000 debut

After impressing in 2016 and climbing the ATP Ranking, Ruud lost in the third and final round of 2017 Australian Open – Men's Singles Qualifying to Reilly Opelka. Ruud then received a wildcard into the ATP 500 event 2017 Rio Open where he defeated Rogério Dutra Silva, Roberto Carballés Baena, and Thiago Monteiro to advance to his first ATP level semi-final. This made him the youngest to make an ATP 500 semi-final since Borna Ćorić at the 2014 Swiss Indoors. Ruud was defeated by Pablo Carreño Busta in the semifinals but reached a career-high ranking of 133. Ruud received a wildcard into the 2017 Miami Open, marking his first appearance at an ATP Masters 1000 tournament.

2018: Grand slam debuts

In 2018, Ruud qualified for his first Grand Slam at the 2018 Australian Open after going through the qualifying competition. This made him the first Norwegian to qualify for any Grand Slam main draw in 17 years. He won the first round against Quentin Halys before losing against Diego Schwartzman in the second round. He would lose to Schwartzman again at the Rio Open. Later on in the season he showed continuous good form and reached two ATP Challenger finals in two weeks. The first one he lost against Italian Gianluigi Quinzi in Francavilla al Mare and then he lost to Pedro Sousa in the Braga Open two weeks later. Both opponents played on home soil. A few weeks later Ruud continued his good form and qualified for the main draw of the French Open for the first time after going through the qualifiers without losing a set. In the first round he defeated Jordan Thompson to match his achievement at the previous slam in Melbourne. He lost against seeded player Albert Ramos Viñolas in the second round. In July he achieved the biggest win of his career so far when he beat defending champion, former world number 3 and current world number 39, David Ferrer 7-5, 6-2 at the 2018 Swedish Open. Later that year Ruud qualified for the US Open for the first time, going through the qualifiers without dropping a set. He lost to Guido Pella in the first round. After struggling with finding consistency in his form after the summer, Ruud finished off the 2018 season by reaching the semi final of three consecutive Challenger Tournaments, which brought him close to his career high ATP Ranking going into a new season.

2019: Top 100 and breakthrough on the ATP Tour

In the 2019 season, Ruud lost in the first qualifying round at the Australian Open, but qualified for the 2019 Rio Open, and won against Carlos Berlocq and fifth seed João Sousa before losing 4-6, 5-7 to Laslo Đere. The result saw him climb to a tied career high ranking of 108. The following week he reached the semi-final of the 2019 Brasil Open, beating Thiago Monteiro, top seed João Sousa and Hugo Dellien before losing to Christian Garín 4-6, 4-6. The result meant that Ruud would climb to inside the top 100 on the ATP Ranking for the first time of his career the following week with a ranking of 94. In April, at the U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships, Ruud reached his first ever ATP Tour level final. In the final he lost to Christian Garín, though his result meant that he copied his father Christian Ruud in reaching the final of an ATP Tour event, being the only two Norwegians to do so. At the 2019 Italian Open, Ruud won his first match in an ATP Tour Masters 1000 tournament. After coming through the qualifiers he went on to beat Dan Evans and Nick Kyrgios before losing 4-6, 4-6 in the third round to Juan Martín del Potro. At the 2019 French Open Ruud beat Ernests Gulbis and 29th seed Matteo Berrettini before losing 3-6, 1-6, 6-7 against Roger Federer in the third round. Ruud also reached the second round at the doubles event alongside Miomir Kecmanović after knocking out former winners and 12th seed Ivan Dodig and Édouard Roger-Vasselin before losing 0-6, 6-1, 2-6 to Federico Delbonis and Guillermo Durán. In July Ruud played his first Wimbledon Championships at the 2019 Wimbledon, losing in the first round to 9th seed John Isner. At the 2019 Generali Open Kitzbühel Ruud made it to the semi-final after beating Pablo Carreño Busta, Matthias Bachinger and Pablo Cuevas before losing to Albert Ramos Viñolas. At the 2019 US Open Ruud once again teamed up with Miomir Kecmanović in doubles. They made it to the third round after eliminating third seeds Raven Klaasen and Michael Venus in the second round. At the 2019 St. Petersburg Open Ruud made the quarter-final before losing in three sets to Borna Ćorić, 6-3, 5-7, 3-6. After his best season so far Ruud qualified for the 2019 Next Generation ATP Finals where he got knocked out in the round robin.

2020: First ATP Title

At the 2020 ATP Cup Ruud lead Norway to a 2–1 victory over the US in the first round robin match after beating John Isner 6–7, 7–6, 7–5 before teaming up with Viktor Durasovic to beat Austin Krajicek and Rajeev Ram in doubles. In the second round robin singles match Ruud beat world no. 12 Fabio Fognini 6–2, 6–2.
In February Ruud made his way to the final of the 2020 Argentina Open where he defeated Pedro Sousa in the final, thus becoming the first tennis player from Norway to win an ATP Tour title and also appear in more than one ATP Tour final. At the same time he surpassed his father Christian's ranking of 39 on the ATP ranking, setting a new record as the highest ranked Norwegian player in ATP history with a ranking of 34 the following week.
Two weeks after his first title Ruud reached the final of 2020 Chile Open but ended up losing 5–7, 6–4, 3–6 against Thiago Seyboth Wild.

Davis Cup

He became a part of the Norwegian Davis Cup team in 2015, and together with countryman Viktor Durasovic made sure Norway was promoted from Group Three Europe Zone to Group Two Europe/Africa Zone.
In the 2016 Davis Cup, Ruud and Durasovic lost 3–2 to Lithuania in the first round. In the play-offs they beat Luxembourg 3–2 to stay in the Group Two Europe/Africa Zone.. Norway remained in Group Two Europe/Africa Zone in 2017 and 2018 before they in 2019 won their tie against Georgia securing them a place in the play off for World Group I as a result of the changes in the Davis Cup format. They won the play off against Barbados and qualified for the World Group I.

Personal life

Ruud is the son of former pro-tennis player Christian Ruud.

ATP career finals

Singles: 3 (1 title, 2 runner-up)

ResultW–LDateTournamentTierSurfaceOpponentScore
Loss0–12019 U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships – Singles|U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships, United States250 SeriesClay Cristian Garín6–7, 6–4, 3–6
Win1–12020 Argentina Open – Singles|Argentina Open, Argentina250 SeriesClay Pedro Sousa6–1, 6–4
Loss1–22020 Chile Open – Singles|Chile Open, Chile250 SeriesClay Thiago Seyboth Wild5–7, 6–4, 3–6

Challengers and Futures finals

Singles (3–6)

ResultDateTournamentTierSurfaceOpponentScore
WinPaguera, SpainFuturesClay Carlos Taberner2–6, 7–6, 6–0
LossBakersfield, USFuturesHard Michael Mmoh4–6, 7–6, 1–6
LossSanta Margherita di Pula, ItalyFuturesClay Stefanos Tsitsipas3–6, 7–6, 6–7
LossKnokke, BelgiumFuturesClay Daniel Altmaier7–6, 1–6, 6–7
WinKaarina, FinlandFuturesClay Mikael Torpegaard6–3, 4–6, 6–0
WinSeville, SpainChallengerClay Taro Daniel6–3, 6–4
LossOslo, NorwayFuturesHard Gianluigi Quinzi4–6, 1–6
LossFrancavilla al Mare, ItalyChallengerClay Gianluigi Quinzi4–6, 1–6
LossBraga, PortugalChallengerClay Pedro Sousa0–6, 6–3, 3–6

Performance timelines

Singles

Current through the 2020 Chile Open.
1 Including matches in Grand Slam, in ATP Tour, in Summer Olympics, and in Davis Cup.

Doubles

1 Including matches in Grand Slam, in ATP Tour, in Summer Olympics, and in Davis Cup.

Record against other players

Record against top 10 players

Ruud's record against players who have been ranked in the top 10. Only ATP Tour main draw matches are considered:

Record against players ranked No. 11–20

Ruud's record against players who have been ranked world No. 11–20. Only ATP Tour main draw matches are considered:
Ruud's record against players who have been ranked world No. 1–20 in matches on the ATP Tour, ATP Challenger Tour, ITF Men's Circuit and Davis Cup.