THE DANGEROUS GAME OF COMPLACENCY
Holger Rune's Latest Struggles — A Product of Inert Complacency
Nadal warned young players to guard against complacency. Rune is now learning of its treachery and paying the staggering price.
Tennis fans had had just about enough with the Holger Rune hype train.
After months of several false starts had resulted in calamitous defeats, fans could be forgiven for expecting better when, for the greater part of a year, this tepid version of Rune has been here to stay.
“We need to start a serious conversation about Holger Rune,” one social media user who appears to be of the Jannik Sinner ilk wrote on X.
In Rome, Rune had strayed into rather familiar territory once again. Another upset. Another embarrassing defeat.
As the melodrama drew to a close, the half-empty Grand Stand Arena, a majestic court at the heart of Rome's Foro Italico, rose to its feet in cascading glory, but Rune was not where he wanted to be.
He was not the center of attention, the last man standing.
He had been thrashed 2-6, 6-2, 6-3 by an injury-riddled Sebastian Baez, the stocky 23-year-old Argentine who won his first match against a Top 20 opponent for the first time in 22 months.
Head down and without waving to the crowd, Rune made the long walk off the Grand Stand Arena and straight down the tunnel wearing the look of a half-baked gladiator, fallen in battle and overpowered by shame in dereliction of his most sacred duty.
When asked about his 2024 plans in January, Rune did not hesitate. As anticipated, he confidently spoke about winning a Grand Slam, finding his rhythm, and feeling “ready” to take the next step in his career.
“You know, (winning a Grand Slam) is a big goal of mine,” an ecstatic Rune told the Australian Open press. “It’s what I’ve been working for all of my life, so I’m eager to achieve it.”
It was the first month of the New Year, making his words all the more insightful.
The 21-year-old had had the time to stoop low, reflect on a disappointing end to the previous campaign, and like a stung Phoenix, felt it was time to rise from the ashes.
At long last, Holger Rune was ready to walk the talk and live up to his rookie hype. The scary part? Many believed him.
But tennis isn’t a game of hollow salutations.
When Rafael Nadal, the personification of blinding focus said, “I expect to play my best on every point and fight for every point like it is the last one,” his words were not just an irrefutable description of himself but a warning of what it takes to be transformed into the imperial tennis player Rune wishes to become.
Does Holger Rune possess that same mentality? Does he have that relentless ability to fight for every point like nothing else matters but that point?
When facing lower-ranked players, does he show them the same credit he would a Top 10 player? Does he evaluate every opposition like he would Novak Djokovic? The evidence suggests not.
Excluding the Australian Open, Rune has been knocked out of five tournaments this season, including two Masters 1000 events, by players ranked outside the ATP's Top 20.
Significantly, three losses were against players ranked in the Top 30 or lower. Three of the five matches ended in two sets lasting less than 60 minutes and featured lopsided final scores like 6-0, 6-1 (twice), and 6-2.
In these matches, Rune won more return points than his opponents on just one occasion, and even that came against the ATP's World No. 57 Alexander Shevchenko.
Rune’s supposed lesser opponents won 130 points by returning his serves. He managed only 73 in return.
One of Rune's most glaring weaknesses remains that his performances fluctuate with the intensity of his opponents.
And until he learns to treat every one of them the same and fight for every point like it is the last one, this festering culture of complacency and mediocrity will hamper whatever big goals he might set for himself.
For Rune, these patterns of results have been a cruel reminder of how thin the margins can be in tennis.
How barely two years after sinking Stefanos Tsitsipas at Roland Garros, his matches, once the hottest ticket in town, now struggle to sell out a 5,000-capacity tennis court in Rome.
He has lost his fear factor. He is no longer the poster boy of retribution. He has become the hunted duck and not the sharp-shooting hunter. The prey and not the predator, all but reduced to a sparring partner fit only for target practice.
When Rune burst onto the scenes two years ago — beating Top 10 players for fun but making tons of unforced errors and double faults — it felt like with age and maturity, these rough edges would smooth out into a refined player.
Last year, according to Infosys, the official ATP stats platform, Rune was the only Top 10 titan with the most average double faults in games when facing opponents ranked in the Top 50.
He won 61.9 percent of his first serves against all players, more than Sinner managed at 59.8 percent, and backed this up by winning 83 percent of his service games.
He made about 25 unforced errors, hit 5.5 aces on average, and converted 39.3 percent of his break points per match.
The expectation was that as he became a better-rounded player this season, these figures would progressively improve. This has been the case with Rune’s average double faults decreasing from an initial 4.1 in 2023 to 3.5 this year, but a huge twist lies in this tale.
In 2024, Rune's winning rate from his first serves has soared from 61.9 percent to 72.9 percent. But ironically (and quite astonishingly), his percentage of service games won has dipped from 83 percent to 65.2 percent.
Opponents are not just getting more joy from his serves, but his inability to finish off points early has resulted in unnecessary energy-sapping matches and conceding breakpoints with alarming regularity.
He is hitting more average aces at 6.4 per match but his breakpoint conversation rate has tanked to 34.1 percent.
For context, out of the 30 opponents Rune has faced this season, only seven are ranked in the Top 20 or higher. Ideally, the rest of them (21) are opponents he’s supposed to defeat quite comfortably, and yet, he has failed to progress to the final of any ATP tournament since January.
Again, it reverts to the original question: how much attention does Rune pay to the individual qualities of players ranked several spots below him? Does he show them the same credit he would a Top 10 player?
Does he fight for every shot as if his life depends on it?
Does he have that extra sharpness that regardless if the drop shot is played by Carlos Alcaraz or Fabian Marozsan, two excellent players with the perfect drop shot disguise, he can scamper from his baseline early just in time for an improbable escape?
These are the hallmarks of imperial tennis players and as it stands, Rune cannot dare to swim in such waters.
Since his breakthrough in 2022, some parts of the media have made unscrupulous efforts to portray Rune as petulant over the past two years.
Some have hitched embarrassing headlines on the looming presence of his mom Aneke; Rune smothered that move earlier this season by announcing she will be stepping back from her role as media manager.
Rune's on-court temperament and emotional outbursts are well documented but there is an understanding within his camp that while this can be “negative” in the words of Patrick Mouratoglou, it enables him “channel himself to be as efficient as he can during a match.”
It is one of Mouratoglou's better comments and certainly holds credence in this regard.
Of all banalities, the one thing Rune cannot be accused of is lacking a fighting spirit. He is a unique player who thrives on emotion and feeds off the energy from the crowd — both dark and pure.
His outbursts sometimes do not necessarily match his efficiency but when they do, the reactions can be spontaneous. Especially when the wrong line calls go against him or he faces an underdog.
There have been several incidents of this nature, notably at the Monte-Carlo Masters this season during a feisty and tightly-contested quarterfinal where he took on not just Sinner, but the chair umpire, match supervisor, and an antagonistic French crowd.
Rune's super performance against Sinner in Monte-Carlo was one of the few occasions he covered himself in glory this season.
Even in the face of defeat with a line call evidently wrong, his performance was fueled by energy, tenacity, grit, and the sheer willpower of wanting to win.
But again, his festering culture of complacency has hardly been against the top players.
Back in Rome at the Italian Open, Rune came up against an underdog in Baez, a player who knew that with luck and focus, his 22-month winless run against a Top 20 opponent could come to an end.
That rotten run looked certain to continue after 30 minutes as Rune was off to a flying start, capturing the first set 6-2, but never looking quite cool and collected after suffering a break in the fifth game.
Baez's pressure or even better, Rune's distinct lack of one, paid off as the Argentine captured the second set by the same scoreline, leaving Rune with questions about how he had survived playing in the Top 10 with such stultifying form of tennis.
In an ideal world, top tennis stars — of which Rune is undeniably one — kick on from situations like this and wrestle the game beyond their opponents' control.
Think of Djokovic and that ominous feeling that once he clicks, anyone will be silly enough to doubt that a player with his armada of attacking options would even consider letting his opponent off the hook.
This puzzle can be explained by Djokovic's self-assuredness and impervious mentality but what unfolded on that cold Italian evening in Rome could not be.
Rune began the third set with a double fault before holding serve at 40-30.
Baez's service game lasted barely two minutes but Rune's, his second of the deciding set, was a chaotic eight-minute mess-of-sloppiness, littered with limp serves and erratic forehands best reserved for target practice.
When Mouratoglou spoke on Rune channeling himself into efficiency, did he mean being held and broken 40-0 twice by a player whose ascent in the sport as a protégé of the ATP's former World No. 3 Juan Martin del Potro has been blighted by injuries?
Did Holger Rune really think that making 15 unforced errors from wild forehand swings against Baez was his own way of feeling “ready” to achieve his search for perfection?
Has he even asked himself why he's yet to win a Grand Slam title? His performance here in Rome was not dissimilar to last year's against Casper Ruud at Roland Garros.
Where will this staggering ineptitude lead and should he continue on this wretched path of unrelenting complacency, where will it end?
Like many other sports, tennis can be a cruel game.
One moment, you're the shiny new thing, beaming at the cameras and dubbed “the future of tennis.” The next, you're the player whose face is barely fit for the advertising billboards.
Patrick McEnroe, former French Open champion and brother of iconic Laver Cup captain John McEnroe, believes that Rune will “evolve” and is a “potential Grand Slam winner.”
Without any doubt, this sentiment is shared by many and the feeling persists that with the right coaching structure and the right supportive environment, he will eventually make good on this promise.
But the underlying notion remains that Rune lacks the consistency to get to where he wants to be and in McEnroe's words, “still makes mistakes out of nowhere” that undermine the very essence of where he thinks he should be.
If Rune had not surged to limelight about the same time as Alcaraz and Sinner, it is almost certain he would not be held to the same elite standards of work ethic, ambition, ethos, and success.
The paradoxical craving for a newly assembled and fairly established trio would only be indicative of tennis' obsession to fill the void left by its virtuoso Big Three.
The die has already been cast and once again, Rune has strayed into rather familiar territory.
Unlike his fellow torchbearers, Rune seems tormented and conflicted, not with the added pressure of being thrust into waning fandom, but the conundrum called Holger Vitus Rune and his apparent inability to lift that golden torch sought since childhood.
It is a paradigm that defies comprehension but perhaps one that emphasizes how his subconscious mind works and why he keeps losing to lesser opposition.
It is easier to focus on a challenge if one believes such hurdle genuinely separates them from a specified and highly sought-after ambition.
The flip side of this equation is that of course it reflects exactly why Rune wallows in this destitute state of utter dysfunction and for those averse to his exclusive channeling methods, has become a provisional source of amusement.
Rafael Nadal, the great orator and model sportsman, ķnew all about the dangers of complacency. Only now is Holger Rune learning of its treachery. And paying its staggering price.
Rune's latest struggles this season highlight everything Nadal said about fighting for every point like it is the last one, playing every match without thinking of its difficulty level — just going on the court to “fight point by point.”
As Roland Garros kicks off in Paris, is Rune ready to run the extra mile to ensure that regardless of the hurdle on Court Philippe-Chatrier, he will be the last man standing?
Whatever new plains this path leads him to remains a mystery but come the end of the season, the highlights-reel of Rune's campaign will certainly make an interesting watch.
For his sake, he will hope it fares better than the miserable Netflix docuseries 'Break Point,' for that too played the dangerous game he flirts with, and paid its staggering price.
Further reading on Holger Rune and Beyond The Scoreboard:
There is no tennis player as adept at winning tiebreaks in recent history as Rune. Whenever the Dane wins a tiebreak, there is almost an 80 percent certainty he will go on to win that game.
Iga Swiatek and Aryna Sabalenka headline a new era in women's tennis, the WTA. As they met for the 11th time in Rome, it was yet another blockbuster.
