Jordan Thompson claims ‘miracle’ double title in Los Cabos
Jordan Thompson showed the value of resilience and never giving up in Los Cabos as he achieved a rare double-title win.
In Los Cabos on Saturday night, the Australian defeated Casper Ruud 6-3, 7-6(4) to win his maiden ATP Tour championship.
This was Thompson’s third tour-level final, and the win ended a thrilling week in which he played five matches for a total of twelve hours.
In the quarter-finals, he rallied from a 6-0, 3-0 deficit against Alex Michelsen with three match point saves.
In the semifinals, he defeated Alexander Zverev in a three-hour, forty-minute battle that concluded around one in the morning on Saturday.
In contrast, his last win was clear-cut, albeit not without its own dramatic denouement.
After trailing 0-2 in the second set, Thompson took the lead 5-3, but Ruud locked in from the baseline late in the set to force a tie-break.
With a powerful serve and a winning forehand on his first championship point, the eighth seed overcame the Norwegian and went on to win the ATP 250 title.
“I spent so many hours on the court this week. In the quarter-final I could have been double bageled, I could have been losing 6-0, 6-0. And now I’m about to lift the trophy, so I think it’s still a miracle,” Thompson said post-match.
After winning the singles match, Thompson defeated the Norwegian again in the doubles semi-finals, this time with the help of Max Purcell. They defeated Ruud and American Will Blumberg 7-6(1), 6-3.
The all-Aussie team finally defeated Gonzalo Escobar of Ecuador and Aleksandr Nedovyesov of Kazakhstan 7-5, 7-6(2) in 98 minutes to win their second championship of the season and third overall and cap an incredible week for Thompson.
Thompson will leave Los Cabos with not just his first championship but also a career-high ATP Ranking of World No 32, eight places higher than where he started the week.
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It seems that Thompson also has a new favourite place in the world after his heroics in the popular holiday destination.
“My favourite place now, without a doubt,” Thompson said of the Mexican city.
Thompson is the first man to claim the singles and doubles title at the same ATP event since Nick Kyrgios won a double at the Citi Open in Washington DC back in 2022.
With the loss, Ruud fell to 10-9 in tour-level finals. It was his second loss of the year and his first against a player not ranked in the top 25.
Ruud was also unable to make it back into the Top 10 in the ATP Rankings having slipped out of the elite bracket last November.