What is a Lucky Loser in tennis: Rules, how they are chosen and tournament winners

James Richardson 12 Mar 2024 11:13 AM

Andrey Rublev kisses the trophy during the awarding ceremony for the men's singles final of the ATP Croatia Open 2017.

Tennis’ Lucky Loser is a technical term and is not as intentionally pejorative as it sounds even if it is a little on the nose.

In tennis, the term Lucky Loser is applied to a player entering a tournament as a replacement player having already lost a knockout match, usually in qualifying for the same tournament.

Football and basketball also use the term Lucky Loser in a similar context.

How is a Lucky Loser chosen?

How the Lucky Loser is chosen has less to do with good fortune and more to do with the player’s current ranking.

In both WTA and ATP events, the selection rules for a Lucky Loser are the same.

From all players eliminated in the final round of qualifying, the highest-ranked player in the rankings will be the first to enter the draw, followed by the second highest-ranked player and so on if more players withdraw before the start of the tournament.

If the tournament needs to replace more players than lost in the final round of qualifying, they proceed through the first-round losers by ranking.

Grand Slam Lucky Losers

Because of potential ethical issues in the final qualifying rounds of the Grand Slams, rankings are not used to determine the order in which Lucky Loser slots in the main draw will be allotted.

Since 2006 all four of the Grand Slams uses a random draw system to determine which players will be handed main draw slots as lucky losers.

The system came to be reviewed after American player Justin Gimelstob received a lucky loser slot in controversial circumstances.

Gimelstob had aggravated a back injury in his previous qualifying match and was set to give Vladimir Voltchkov a walkover when officials advised him that he was in line to be the first Lucky Loser if he played at least one game of his final qualifier.

The incident was not sanctioned but it led to a rule change in Grand Slam tennis.

Has a Lucky Loser won a Grand Slam

There has never been a Lucky Loser who has gone on to win a Grand Slam.

The best a Lucky Loser has done on Grand Slam tennis is reach the round of 16 with Maria Gaidano the first woman to achieve the feat at the 1993 US Open.

Dick Norman was the first and to date only man to reach the fourth round of Grand Slam as a Lucky Loser.

Lucky losers winning tournaments

In all ten men have won ATP Tour tournaments as lucky losers with the most recent of those being Soonwoo Kwon. Kwon lost against Tomas Machac in the final round of qualifying in Adelaide in 2023 before he enterered the main draw as a Lucky Loser and defeated the Czech en route to the trophy at the ATP 250.

Six women have won titles at WTA 250 and higher level after entering the main draw as a Lucky Loser.

There were three new additions to this club in 2023 with Maria Timofeeva also becoming the first player to win a title on WTA Tour debut since 2001 when she claimed the Hungarian Grand Prix as a Lucky Loser. Nao Hibino and Sara Sorribes Tormo ensured that 2023 was bumper year for the Lucky Loser on the WTA Tour.

The WTA recognizes Andrea Jaeger as the first lucky loser to win a WTA title, in Las Vegas in 1980. Olga Danilović was the first Lucky Loser to win a WTA Tour event in the 21st century after her trophy run in Moscow in 2018. Coco Gauff defeated Jelena Ostapenko 6–3, 1–6, 6–2 at the Upper Austria Ladies Linz tournament at the age of 15 to become the third woman to accomplish the feat in October 2019.

Prior to Kwon’s triump in Adelaide in 2023, nine men had achieved a title win as Lucky Loser since 1978.

Heinz Gunthardt (Springfield) and Bill Scanlon (Maui), both won tournaments as Luck Losers in 1978 but it wouldn’t be until 1990 that it was achieved again.

Francisco Clavet broke the duck at Hilversum, before Christian Miniussi joined in 1991 after a title run in São Paulo.

Sergiy Stakhovsky won Zagreb in 2008 as a Lucky Loser, Rajeev Ram in 2009 in Newport, Andrey Rublev in 2017 in Umag, Leonardo Mayer in the following week in 2017 in Hamburg, and Marco Cecchinato at the Hungarian Open in 2018.