Jack Draper schools Brazilian upstart with brutal display at Indian Wells

Telegraph

08-03-2025

The stadium court at Indian Wells drew a strong South American contingent on Saturday. The fans were looking for an early glimpse of Joao Fonseca: the 18-year-old Brazilian who won last year's Next Gen ATP Finals.
But it was British No 1 Jack Draper who dominated the stage, giving a masterclass in how to subdue a flashy young talent. Continuing the excellent form he has shown all season, Draper brushed Fonseca aside in just 75 minutes.
The second set of Draper's 6-3, 6-0 victory was a real schooling. On this evidence, the conditions in the Californian desert – where he had previously demonstrated his own rich promise by reaching the fourth round in 2023 – are well suited to his spin-heavy game.
Draper varied his play skilfully, mixing up the trajectory of his ground strokes and also tossing in plenty of drop shots to keep Fonseca off balance. A loopy cross-court forehand often set up a flatter and more decisive strike up the line.
The scoreline does not quite convey the whole story, however, because Fonseca had undoubtedly rocked Draper in the early stages with his massive swings and wild-eyed ambition.
Fonseca's returns were particularly punishing, and Draper did well to limit the damage to a single break of serve in a highly competitive first half-hour.
Draper's anxiety receded after a crucial ninth game, in which he defended superbly and drew a series of cheap errors from his over-enthusiastic opponent.
This was the second break of the Fonseca serve – which may also have owed something to a malfunctioning fire alarm that interrupted play for 20 seconds or so – and it changed the whole complexion of the match. From then on, we found ourselves watching an exhibition of Draper's tactical and technical mastery.
Draper's dominance was all the more impressive because Fonseca has already convinced many tennis insiders that he is the next big thing: a talent to place alongside the young Carlos Alcaraz.
This was only Fonseca's 17th match on the regular ATP Tour, but he had demonstrated his extraordinary potential by winning his maiden title in Buenos Aires three weeks ago. He also took out a top-10 opponent – Andrey Rublev – in the first round of January's Australian Open.
Draper hails arrival of 'really young superstar'
As an indication of Draper's quality, this was comfortably the most chastening defeat that Fonseca has suffered in the 11 months since his tour debut in Portugal. It also featured the first 6-0 'bagel' set of his young career.
'I think it's amazing for the tour that we've got a really young superstar coming, especially from Brazil with such a big fanbase,' said Draper afterwards. 'It seems like every tournament he's going to, there's so many fans in the stadium. To be a part of that is really special for myself.
'I saw for myself that he's such an amazing talent, hits the ball so hard and he's only going to improve. Just a bit more experience at this level and he's going to be a top player very soon.'
In the same interview, carried out by Karthi Gnanasegaram for Sky Sports, Draper said that he was mostly happy with his all-round performance.
The only concern was his serve, which coughed up six double-faults, including three in a row as he served for the match at 6-3, 5-0. If he is to deliver a deep run, he will need to land more than 55 per cent of his first serves.
'I struggled last year a lot with my serve here,' said Draper. 'Conditions are very different. It's hard for the ball to come down [and] it flies quite a lot. I definitely served better today but there's still a lot of room for improvement, I'm glad I came through today so I can go and work hard on that.'
This win earned Draper a third-round meeting with Jenson Brooksby, the American who was banned for most of last season after missing three doping tests.
Draper made an interesting scheduling decision in the build-up to Indian Wells, skipping Dubai to manage his own workload. The sharpness of this performance suggests that it was the right call.