Tsitsipas among early arrivals at US Open; set for Top 4 seeding

World No. 6 Stefanos Tsitsipas is among the first top players to arrive at Flushing Meadows, and has already hit on court.

The rising player from Greece, who just turned 22, will compete next week at the Western & Southern Open and the US Open, where there will be just three players seeded in front of him: Novak Djokovic, Dominic Thiem and Daniil Medvedev.

Two years ago, Tsitsipas had just had his big breakthrough in Toronto, defeating Thiem, Djokovic and Alexander Zverev to get to the final of the ATP Masters 1000 event. He describes the win against No. 1 Djokovic as among the best of his career.

"I was actually not paying attention that much if I was facing Novak Djokovic or whoever else. I was concentrating on my game," Tsitsipas recently told the ATP tour website. "I knew that if I would start thinking too much, then it wouldn't be good for my game, so I said, 'Keep playing, keep doing what you're doing.

"That match point, I couldn't believe it, what had just happened. It was one of the best victories I'd had."

Tsitsipas also turned around his contest against Zverev when down 3-6, 3-5, and, despite falling to Rafael Nadal in the final, had turned into a crowd favorite.

"It was just the energy I received in every single match I played there. Everyone was with me and it gave me a lot of strength. It gave me a lot of belief," he said.

Since then, he has reached the Australian Open semifinals and won the 2019 ATP Finals. And he was on a roll when tour competition was suspended, having won the Marseille trophy and adding a runner-up finish to Djokovic in Dubai a week later.

Tsitsipas, who owns five ATP titles and competed at the Ultimate Tennis Showdown during the ATP's hiatus, only has points to gain in the next few weeks after falling in the first round of Cincinnati and the US Open in 2019.