In conversation with Jack Draper as he reveals how he picked his comeback event

British No 1 Jack Draper was on course to qualifying for the ATP Finals in Turin until injury halted his march to what would have been a debut appearance in the end-of-season showpiece event.

An arm injury cut short his campaign at the US Open and he was then forced to call time on his season, but Draper will play again in 2025 as he has confirmed he will compete in front of his British fans in the UTS Grand Final in London between at the Copper Box Arena December 5-7.

Jack Draper, seeded third, has been drawn in Group B, alongside Grand Slam finalist Casper Ruud, Latin American star Francisco Cerundolo and Belgian talent David Goffin. Last year’s UTS London Grand Final champion Alex de Minaur heads up Group A, with former top five player Andrey Rublev, Czech prodigy Tomas Machac and French maestro Adrian Mannarino.

This year’s UTS London Grand Final boasts the strongest player field in the event’s history with five players who have boasted career-high top ten rankings and two previous Grand Final champions in Draper and De Minaur.

The eight players will compete for the title of 2025 UTS Grand Final champion and a share of a total prize-money pot of $1,865,000 (£1,394,000).

Draper revealed his thoughts on his return to the UTS stage next month and he believes the event will help his efforts to comeback to his best form ahead of the 2026 season.

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Are you happy with where you’re at? Did you feel good on court hitting today?

Yeah, look, I’m building up. I’m still a while away from playing the UTS event, and I think, you know, I’m going to be more than ready to compete there. But is one of those things where you have to take this kind of injury slowly, and you have to be really ready and not let something linger for a while. And I think I came back a bit too soon when I played the US Open so after that I decided to really shut it down and look after it. And now I’m building up my confidence and building up my tennis to be at full throttle again.

Has the timing of UTS London Grand Final worked out quite well, given your injury break?

Yeah, look, I mean it’s a chance to compete, also a chance to play the world’s best players again. I think when you have time out the game, it’s really important to sort of get on their speed again. And having the opportunity to play before the coming season is important, I think, and really importantly for me, playing in front of my home crowd, playing at the UTS in London, playing at the Copper Box Arena, haven’t played there before, so I’m looking forward to that. I think it’s going to be nice to be able to…you know…there’s been a lot of training and a lot of waiting around and competing is what I do best. I’m looking forward to that.

It must be hard to replicate that level of intensity with practice? UTS is especially intense because of the format.

Definitely, yeah. I think it’s really good for your endurance. You know, obviously, the eight minutes straight, and the different timings and all that sort of stuff. It’s, there’s a lot of different rules, and that makes it harder physically. So it’s good prep for what’s to come for me, and I’m going to need a lot of lot of reps in my body to, you know, to get back to full fitness.

You won the event in 2023. When you look back at that, how different a player are you now and what did you take away from it at the time?

Yeah, I mean, I think I’ve changed so much as a player, as a person you know, since then. It’s been a couple years now, so I improved a lot in my game, I’ve had lot of new experiences on the tour, and I think I’m a lot more of a well-rounded player. But I definitely think the experience of playing the UTS a couple years ago was something that gave me a lot of confidence. You know, I know it’s not an event on the tour, but the chance to play against the world’s best players and beat them like I did then gave me a bit of a springboard to feel confident to do it in on the tour as well. So I’m looking forward to just, hopefully getting that confidence and playing against them.

You have to play David Goffin, then Francisco Cerundolo and Casper Ruud in three days. Is UTS an interesting challenge for you? 

Of course it is. Yeah, it has a lot of fun, especially with the UTS rules, it creates a kind of a bit of a carnage to it, and I think that’s really fun for the spectators, and also as players, it’s something a bit different. We’re used to playing a certain format all the time. So to have a bit of versatility in what we’re doing is going to be going to be really fun. So I know those guys, they’re all good guys as well, and they’ve all got great games. So those matches will be a lot of fun.

WHAT IS UTS?

* 4 quarters of 8 minutes each
* Less time (15 seconds) between points
* No second serve
* Unlimited coaching from the sidelines
* Player interviews between the quarters
* Strategic use of bonus cards by players