Novak Djokovic will make his long-awaited return at the Shanghai Masters and he could potentially face both Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz.
The 24-time Grand Slam winner has only played 40 matches this year with his last outing his third-round defeat at the US Open at the end of August.
Following his loss at Flushing Meadows, Djokovic admitted that his schedule for the remainder of the year will be “spontaneous” with only one official event confirmed: the Shanghai Masters.
The Serbian – a four-time winner in Shanghai with his last title coming in 2018 – has signed up for the ATP Masters 1000 event for the first time since 2019.
The 37-year-old has slipped to No 4 in the ATP Rankings since his US Open defeat, finding himself behind world No 1 Sinner, Alexander Zverev and Alcaraz.
Sinner leads the way in the official ATP Rankings with 11,180 points with Zverev on 6,875, Alcaraz has 6,690 and Djokovic on 5,560 although the calculations still need to be updated after this week’s two ATP 500 events.
The seedings, though, are based on the September 23 rankings and it means he could potentially meet Sinner in the semi-final and Zverev or Alcaraz in the final. Or he could face Zverev in the last four or one of Sinner and Alcaraz in the final.
The Shanghai Masters – the penultimate ATP 1000 event of the year – has been hit by a couple of withdrawals with defending champion Hubert Hurkacz out due to a knee injury while Alex de Minaur is struggling with a hip injury.
The good news for Djokovic is that he doesn’t have any points to defend in the 96-player draw in Shanghai so could move up in the official rankings with a title run, but the three ahead of him will also not drop too many points with Sinner defending 90 points, Zverev 0 and Alcaraz 90.
He also remains in the running in the Race To Turin with his hopes of qualifying for the season-ending receiving a boost recently.
The Serbian is currently in ninth position with only the top eight qualifying, but a lot of his rivals have lost early in this week’s Beijing and Tokyo events while De Minaur (eighth in the rankings) is out injured.
Seedings for Shanghai Masters:
1. Jannik Sinner
2. Alexander Zverev
3. Carlos Alcaraz
4. Novak Djokovic
5. Daniil Medvedev
6. Andrey Rublev
7. Taylor Fritz
8. Casper Ruud
9. Grigor Dimitrov
10. Stefanos Tsitsipas
11. Tommy Paul
12. Holger Rune
13. Frances Tiafoe
14. Sebastian Korda
15. Ben Shelton
16. Lorenzo Musetti
17. Ugo Humbert
18. Jack Draper
19. Félix Auger-Aliassime
20. Alejandro Tabilo
21. Alexei Popyrin
22. Arthur Fils
23. Sebastián Báez
24. Alexander Bublik
25. Karen Khachanov
26. Nicolás Jarry
27. Jordan Thompson
28. Francisco Cerúndolo
29. Flavio Cobolli
30. Matteo Arnaldi
31. Tomas Machac
32. Tomás Martín Etcheverry
Leave a Reply