If Wimbledon had distributed points, what would be the ATP ranking?

With the ATP Finals, the 2022 season has reached its verdict. At 19 years old, Carlos Alcaraz finishes the year at the top. But the ATP ranking does not include one of the four Grand Slam tournaments, as Wimbledon decided not to award any points. If this had been the case, would Alcaraz still have been on the throne? Who are the winners and losers of this no-op?

“There is no ‘if’. ‘If’ doesn’t exist.” This is one of Rafael Nadal’s favorite phrases. He is right in the absolute. There is only one reality. For the ATP rankings, it indicates that Carlos Alcaraz finished this season as the world number one ahead of, in order, Rafael Nadal, Casper Ruud, Stefanos Tsitsipas and Novak Djokovic.

But since 2022 is a very special case, with no points in any of the four Grand Slam tournaments, we wanted to see what the final ranking would have looked like in a normal configuration, if Wimbledon had not been on the sidelines. Would Carlos Alcaraz have ended up on the throne after all? Would he have been overtaken by Rafael Nadal? Where would Novak Djokovic stand? What about Nick Kyrgios, the unfortunate finalist against the Serbian? To begin, let’s recall the scale of a Grand Slam tournament:

Winner: 2000 points
Finalist: 1200 points
Semifinalist: 720 points
Quarter-finalist: 360 points
Round of 16: 180 points
Round of 16: 90 points
Round of 32: 45 points
1st round : 10 points

Winner for the 7th time on the Centre Court, Novak Djokovic was the main loser of the unilateral decision of the All England Club on the strictly accounting level. The “Djoker” officially finished with 4,820 points, which is 2,000 points less than Carlos Alcaraz. With 6,820 points, he would have come close to the young Spaniard, but the latter had reached the round of 16 on the English grass. He would have maintained a 180-point margin over Djokovic despite his absence from the Masters in Turin and the Serb’s impressive showing at the Pala Alpitour last week.

Rafael Nadal was deprived of the 720 points from his semifinal match at Wimbledon, where he forfeited the match against Nick Kyrgios. His final total should have been 6740 points. Despite winning two Grand Slam titles this year, the Majorcan would have had to settle for third place. However, the top three would be in a tightly packed pack, with only 260 points separating the first from the third.

Behind them, the two big winners of this ranking reshaped with Wimbledon are obviously Nick Kyrgios and Cameron Norrie. The Australian, ranked 22nd in the world at the end of this season, would have actually finished in the Top 10 with the points from his final in London. With 3070 points, he would be ranked 11th, the best ranking of his career. He would be just behind Cameron Norrie, who was unable to capitalize on his first major semi-final. The Briton would be 10th. At the top of the rankings, in terms of places, Kyrgios and Norrie are clearly the main losers from the lack of points at Wimbledon.

Further down the hierarchy, two players can have big regrets. David Goffin, first of all. The Belgian has had a difficult season, but his best result at a major tournament came at Wimbledon when he reached the quarter-finals. For nothing, at least as far as the ranking is concerned. 52nd on Monday, he should have been 20 places higher. The same goes for Christian Garin (quarter finalist). The Chilean, 85th in the world, loses about 40 places in the case.

And what about Tim van Rijthoven. The Dutchman, the great revelation of the short grass court season, reached the round of 16 before losing to Novak Djokovic. He lost 180 points in the process. With these, the great Dutch server would not be 115th like today, but around 115th place. For a player of his rank, this changes everything. He would, for example, automatically qualify for the next Australian Open…

THE 2022 RANKING WITH WIMBLEDON POINTS

In brackets, the difference with the official ranking

1. Carlos Alcaraz (Spain) : 7000 points (-)
2. Novak Djokovic (Serbia) : 6820 points (+3)
3. Rafael Nadal (Spain) : 6740 points (-1)
4. Casper Ruud (Norway) : 5865 points (-1)
5. Stefanos Tsitsipas (Greece) : 5640 points (-1)
6. Felix Auger-Aliassime (Canada) : 4205 points (-)
7. Daniil Medvedev (Russia) : 4065 points (-)
8. Andrey Rublev (Russia) : 3930 points (-)
9. Taylor Fritz (USA) : 3715 points (-)
10. Cameron Norrie (Great Britain) : 3165 points (+4)
11. Nick Kyrgios (Australia) : 3070 points (+12)
12. Hubert Hurkacz (Poland) : 2915 points (-2)
13. Holger Rune (Denmark) : 2898 points (-2)
14. Jannik Sinner (Italy) : 2770 points (+1)
15. Alexander Zverev (Germany) : 2700 points (-3)
16. Pablo Carreno Busta (Spain) : 2505 points (-3)
17. Matteo Berrettini (Italy) : 2375 points (-1)
18. Frances Tiafoe (USA) : 2180 points (+1)
19. Denis Shapovalov (Canada) : 2120 points (-1)
20. Marin Cilic (Croatia) : 2105 points (-3)