US Open: Oscar Otte - a late career is becoming more and more popular
Oscar Otte is playing today (from 6 p.m. CEST live on Eurosport and in our live ticker) for his first round of 16 at a Grand Slam tournament. The opponent will be the South Tyrolean Andreas Seppi.
by Jörg Allmeroth
last edit: Sep 04, 2021, 02:27 am
When Oscar Otte was allowed to play against Roger Federer on the Center Court of the French Open at the end of May 2019, he still looked like an astonished child who had thrown it into a tennis wonderland. The whole thing was “totally unreal”, said Otte at the time, “I play against my own idol. Against someone I usually only admire on TV. ”Otte did well back then, he lost in three sets, but showed his typical game full of courage and passion. At the end of the day, Federer officially recorded that Otte would still be heard: "This is a man with guts."
Two years and three months later, Otte is still a commuter between different tennis worlds. He often travels to the arenas of the second or sometimes also the third position, the equally demanding Challenger and Future competitions. Directly before the current Grand Slam elimination games in the Big Apple, the tall boy from Cologne's Südstadt was, for example, still involved in the Chellenger tournament in his native Meerbusch.
Otte is rewarded for the hard work
But more and more often Otte can also be admired on the largest stages, with the majors, which massively depict the value and importance of a professional player. To do well there, "that counts more than anything," knows Otte, who reached the round of 32 in a Grand Slam spectacle for the first time on Thursday with a sovereign three-set win against the American Denis Kudla. “It is a brutally beautiful moment”, says Otte, “the reward for everything that has been invested in recent years.” Incidentally, the reward for many a setback in injuries, for longer breaks in which he was involved in tennis could only watch passed out.
And slowly but steadily, the giant is now fighting its way towards the best, the celebrities in the industry, the top performers, the lighthouse players. “I notice that I feel more and more comfortable at this level, on this terrain,” says the 28-year-old, who is one of the late-career workers who only begin to fully exploit their potential in their mid-twenties or late thirties. Otte sees himself well on his way to "spending a few more nice years" in the caravan of tennis nomads and realizing some of his dreams, including the one "one day playing for Germany, preferably in the Davis Cup."
In Paris against Zverev in front
As an outsider who got into the big tennis by chance, nobody sees him anymore despite ranked 144th place. Which mainly has to do with two remarkable Grand Slam performances this year. At the French Open, Otte seemed to be close to one of the biggest surprises of the season when he took the lead in the first round with 2-0 sets against compatriot and co-favorite Alexander Zverev - before he first had the strength and then the confidence to win Five-set loss left. In the second Wimbledon round against Scotland's Braveheart Andy Murray, Otte was also in the front with 2-1 sets in the summer before the loss of strength came. And with him the tournament out. Murray by no means dutifully shouted to him on the network that he should just keep going, then the results would come.
Whatever Otte adhered to. Now, after a dramatic two weeks, he is in the third major round for the first time - although on the very first US Open meters, in the unpretentious application phase without spectators, he was several times before the knockout. Otte had to fend off match points against both the Argentine Renzo Olivo and the French Constant Lestienne in the qualification, he also fought against himself, against the nausea in oppressive humidity, he vomited in both tennis thrillers, finally stood after another three -Set fight in the last round in the main draw. "It's crazy. But I like these competitive matches, these ups and downs, these emotional fluctuations, "says Otte," it's a challenge that I am happy to accept. "
He has already earned around 150,000 euros at this US Open in 2021, the biggest prize money check of his career. Against the eternal tennis vagabond Andreas Seppi, the 37-year-old South Tyrolean, there could be a little more financial means of spending on the way. It could also take longer and longer, a five-set match against marathon man Seppi would be quite possible. "I'm prepared for anything," says Otte, the Cologne boy, "this journey should go a little further."
Here the single tableau in New York
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