The Greek tennis star Seriously Considered Walking Away During Injury-Plagued Campaign
Stefanos Tsitsipas was the 26th seed at last year's US Open
Stefanos Tsitsipas has revealed he thought about ending his career because of severe back issues throughout the 2025 tennis year.
The 27-year-old, who has reached a career-high ranking of world number three, was a finalist to Novak Djokovic in the finals of the 2021 French Open alongside the 2023 Australian Open.
Now ranked as the world's 36th best player after a limited schedule since his second-round departure in New York in August, he stated that ongoing treatment has begun yielding encouraging progress.
"I'm most excited is to observe how my training responds during actual training with regard to my injury," said Tsitsipas.
"The biggest fear centered on if I could complete a match," he added, explaining the pain had troubled him "for the past six to eight months."
"I kept asking, 'Am I able to play another contest without discomfort?'"
"I became truly frightened following the loss at the US Open [to Germany's Daniel Altmaier]. I was unable to move for 48 hours. That is the moment start reconsidering your career's future."
Tsitsipas further mentioned being content with his current recovery plan after finishing five weeks of off-season preparation without any pain.
His next appearance with the Greek team in the United Cup, where they face Naomi Osaka's Japan and the Great Britain squad captained by Raducanu. The tournament will be held across Australian cities from 2 to 11 January, just before the Australian Open.
"The greatest victory for 2026 is to stop worrying about finishing matches," he expressed.
"It provides fantastic feedback to know you had an off-season in good health – I hope it continues. I aim to perform in 2026 and at the United Cup.
"I have done the work. The most important thing is complete faith that I can return to where I was. I will attempt everything to achieve that."
