Roman Safiullin, trying to be the next Karatsev, earns praise from compatriot Medvedev and opponent Sinner

LONDON—For the second time in three seasons, a Russian baseliner is undergoing a career transformation at a Grand Slam.

Just as a then-ranked world No. 114, Aslan Karatsev, stifled the likes of Felix Auger-Aliassime and Grigor Dimitrov at the 2021 Australian Open, 92nd-ranked Roman Safiullin is turning heads at Wimbledon.

The parallels weren’t lost on Safiullin’s next opponent, Jannik Sinner.

“It reminds me a little bit of the story of Karatsev in Australia, no? He plays some very, very good tennis,” the eighth seed told reporters.

One more win for Safiullin and the 25-year-old will match Karatsev’s semifinal at a Grand Slam.

While Karatsev appeared in his first Grand Slam main draw in Melbourne two years ago, Safiullin is making his bow in a Wimbledon main draw. To add to the similarities, both possess stellar backhands, and their demeanor on-court could hardly be described as upbeat. Who could forget Elena Vesnina trying to bring a smile to Karatsev’s face throughout the Tokyo Olympics as they combined in the mixed doubles?

Yet they are unfussy and softly spoken in their dealings with the media.

Karatsev pocketed about $570,000 when making it to the last four, with Safiullin so far bagging roughly $435,000 for his week’s-plus work that included downing past Wimbledon semifinalists Roberto Bautista Agut in a maiden five-setter, and Auger Aliassime’s fellow Canadian, Denis Shapovalov.

If the hefty funds will prove invaluable to his career, so will the increased belief.

“It should for sure help me with confidence, and especially this confidence is not easy to get, because the confidence, you get it only through the matches, through winning matches, and that's what I’m basically doing now,” said Safiullin, who lacks a clothing sponsor.

Shapovalov was hampered by a leg injury in the last two sets on Sunday, but if a little luck went Safiullin’s way, he might feel he deserved it after suffering serious shoulder and ankle injuries early in his career—among other physical issues. Those setbacks slowed his progression after rising to No. 2 in the junior ranks, where he defeated fellow Russians Daniil Medvedev and Andrey Rublev—who have joined him in the quarterfinals at SW19.

Safiullin climbed from 884th to 334th in the calendar year-end rankings from 2015 to 2016 before stalling. It took him until early 2020 to crack the Top 200, and 2022 to land in the Top 100.

Medvedev, not just one of the world’s best players but a keen follower of the sport, said of Safiullin last week, “he has big talent.”

Even more insightful were the 2021 US Open champion’s words at the ATP Cup when Safiullin was part of the team.

“When I knew that Roman is in my draw in juniors, I was shaking,” Medvedev said last year. “We played actually a lot of finals, semifinals, a lot of matches, some were like three-hour, three-set matches.”

This year, Safiullin strung together an encouraging clay-court swing, reaching the third round in both Rome and Madrid as a qualifier despite dealing with a hip injury that flares up on the clay. He skipped Geneva and couldn’t compete in Roland Garros qualifying—forgetting to sign in. But Safiullin said even if he didn’t forget, he likely would have bypassed Paris due to the hip injury.

He thus had more time to prepare for the grass with coach and former No. 39, Andrey Kuznetsov, in a mini training block.

“Before clay for example we had 10 days of practice,” Kuznetsov said after Wimbledon practice on Monday. “The first tournament usually after this small pre-season, he is not playing good because he is probably tired. But the second and third tournament he is playing better and better, and it was like this on clay.

“It was basically the same on grass. He played bad in Stuttgart (last month) and then like, the next tournament better and better, and now good.”

What has been the key to Safiullin’s upturn? There has been no magic formula.

“We just hit a lot of balls from the corner, from the middle, running, so a lot of balls and a lot of repetition, and he feels good after this kind of work,” said Kuznetsov, who made a comeback last year after his own hip troubles.

Kuznetsov addressed Safiullin’s body language, too.

“That was the most important,” he said. “Because every time when he wins the point, it was nothing, like no emotions, nothing. And when he loses the point, it was like a disaster, and he was showing it. So the first thing was to stop doing this.

“And now I think we improved a lot. He is still doing it time after time but it is much better. Just yesterday I was telling him two to three times during the match that he, because he was forgetting to support himself, show some emotions. Put the racquet up or something like this, say ‘Come on’ whatever.”

To keep his momentous Wimbledon going, Safiullin must upset Sinner. Their lone duel at the ATP Cup last year could bolster his spirits.

Safiullin lost 7-6 (6), 6-3, although he held a set point at 6-5 in the first and created 12 break points. Sinner saved 11 of them.

“Especially in the first set, I remember I made some problems to him, so I hope to make also some good notes from that match and to improve the tactic and my performance for the next match,” said Safiullin.

The affable Kuznetsov joked that he could still beat Safiullin on grass, having twice made the third round at Wimbledon.

He has been outdone by Safiullin, though, not that he would mind.