Jack Draper clinches key rankings breakthrough as he achieves Queen’s Club first
Jack Draper clinched a potentially significant rankings jump with a hard-fought three-set victory against world No 32 Brandon Nakashima at the 2025 Queen’s Club Championships.
The British star prevailed 6-4, 5-7, 6-4 in a entertaining quarter-final contest played in the heat on the Andy Murray Arena.
Draper earned the only break of the opening set at 2-1 and took the set when he converted his sixth set point — holding from 0-40 when serving at 5-4.
In the second set, Nakashima was imperious on serve as he did not face a single break point, and he took his opportunity to level the match by breaking Draper with the Brit serving at 5-6.
The deciding set followed a similar pattern to the opener as Draper secured the only break — this time in the seventh game — before digging himself out of a 15-40 hole to serve the match out.
With his victory, Draper has leapfrogged Taylor Fritz into the world No 4 position in the Live ATP Rankings, moving 15 points clear of the American onto 4,650 points.
Draper was ranked sixth heading into Queen’s, but he will return to his career-high spot of fourth when the rankings update next week. He is also set to move above Novak Djokovic.
This means Draper is guaranteed to be seeded fourth at the 2025 Wimbledon Championships, with Fritz having lost in the opening round at the Queen’s ATP 500.
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A top four seeding means Draper will not face Jannik Sinner or Carlos Alcaraz until at least the semi-finals of the grass-court Grand Slam.
In theory, this could offer Draper a more favourable path to make a deep run at the All England Club as he will be projected to face a player seeded between fifth and eighth in the quarter-finals.
One player Draper could meet at the last eight stage, however, is 24-time Grand Slam winner and seven-time Wimbledon champion Djokovic.
Most significantly, Draper has to reach the semi-finals before worrying about who he faces — something he stressed when asked about the seeding in his on-court interview.
“I keep on getting asked about top four seeding but I have to get to the semis first! To get to that position is an incredible feeling,” Draper said.
“It is testament to the work me and my team have done and I am proud of that.”
The 23-year-old is yet to progress beyond the second round at his home Grand Slam and holds a 2-3 record from his three appearances at the event.
Draper, who is through to the semi-finals at Queen’s for the first time, will face world No 30 Jiri Lehecka on Saturday.
