Taylor Fritz and Hubert Hurkacz will both miss next week’s Monte-Carlo Masters due to injuries, dealing a blow to the first major clay-court event of the season.
The Monte-Carlo tournament kicks off the clay Masters 1000 series on April 6th, running through April 13th. Unlike other Masters events, this one isn’t mandatory – which is why some players choose to skip it, especially those who don’t love playing on clay.
Fritz and Hurkacz aren’t exactly clay-court specialists, but that’s not why they’re sitting this one out.
| Name | Age | Points | Stats 2024 |
|---|---|---|---|
| pl Hubert Hurkacz | 28 | 3,995 | 29 - 12 |
Hurkacz has been sidelined since before the Miami Open, and clearly needs more recovery time. The Polish star shared some practice footage on social media showing him hitting on clay courts – a positive sign – but admitted he wasn’t ready for competition yet.
“Skipping MC [Monte-Carlo] this time. Got some homework to finish!” Hurkacz wrote.
Fritz’s situation looks a bit more worrying.
The 27-year-old American has been playing great tennis this year with 14 wins in 20 matches, but picked up an injury during his impressive Miami Open run, where he reached the semifinals before losing to teenage champion Jakub Mensik.
Fritz revealed he was dealing with an abdominal issue that flared up during his quarter-final against Berrettini.
“The main issue was I felt like in my match with Berrettini, returning how I was returning, I kind of reinjured the injury l’d been dealing with,” Fritz explained. “Think of it like this. When it’s like an ab injury, it’s a lot of force through it when I’m catching the ball.”
He tried to play through it but quickly realized that wasn’t smart.
“I felt like towards the end of the match with Berrettini, end of the second set, I felt like I kind of reinjured that thing that I’ve been dealing with. I tried a bit in the warm-up trying to return like that. It was bugging me. I felt like injury-wise it wasn’t a good idea to do it.”
Fritz initially pulled out of the Ultimate Tennis Showdown exhibition event in Nimes, calling it a precaution.
“I was super excited to come back to the UTS Tour after I made the final in Los Angeles in 2023,” he said. “Unfortunately, I aggravated an abdominal injury during my semi-final match in Miami, and I will not be able to recover in time to compete in Nimes this week.”
But his subsequent withdrawal from Monte-Carlo suggests the injury might be more serious than first thought.
Despite these setbacks, both players are currently still on the entry list for the ATP 500 event in Munich scheduled for the week after Monte-Carlo. Whether they’ll actually be fit enough to play remains to be seen.
