Holger Rune barely had time to pack and leave The Royal Lawn Tennis Club after the triumph in this year’s Stockholm Open, before the next generation of world stars take over the arena.
In other words, it’s time for the Kungens Kanna & Drottningens Pris, in which Holger Rune participated back in 2016. Due to the pandemic, this year’s event takes place after the prestigious Masters’ playoffs in Monte Carlo, the competition will be the starting point and key for the 2023 playoff spots.
Kungens Kanna (boys):
Among the 13-year-olds, we find Svit Suljic (Slovenia) and Savva Rybkin, who met last year in the final of Tennis Europe’s playoffs for the best 12-year-olds. We expect that at least one of these boys will remain in the competition when the final rounds approach.
Austrian Maximilian Heidlmair is another player to keep an eye on. This summer, he reached the final of the first-ever Tennis Europe competition on grass in Roehampton, London.
A Swedish hopeful Victor Rydén was recently honoured with the Stefan Edberg scholarship as Sweden’s best 14-year-old. Victor, from Södertälje, has competed extensively on the Tennis Europe Junior Tour and is ranked top 50.
Drottningens Pris (girls).
On the girls’ side, it’s a real “dog fight” with a lot of tough competition. Czech Veronika Sekerkova is chasing her ninth Tennis Europe title; the left-handed Romanian Giulia Safina Popa is ranked fourth in Europe among 14-year-olds even though she is only 13 years old. Her slightly unbelievable record of 84 won matches this year explains that ranking. Italian tennis is on the rise, and we will have the chance to see the physically strong Angelica Sara fight for every ball. It remains to be seen if this will be enough in this event lineup.
The Swedish team will have to work hard as usual. But for KLTK, having a player on the way up will be fun to follow; 13-year-old Rebecca Malmström has won both in Turkey and Norway, reached finals in the Netherlands and Estonia is, of course, ready to put up a good fight this year.