ATP Tour

Zverev: When Roland Garros win sunk in, texts from Nadal & more

A night of celebration — and by his own admission, only a little sleep — did little to dampen the initial ecstasy of Grand Slam glory for Alexander Zverev.

Speaking the day after he lifted his maiden major title at Roland Garros, the German reflected on the vast array of emotions that came with his triumph. Having downed Flavio Cobolli to win his first Grand Slam crown on his fourth championship-match appearance, Zverev was perhaps still trying to clearly break down his milestone moment on the Parisian clay.

“It was just relief, joy, everything together;” the No. 3 player in the PIF ATP Rankings told ATPTour.com. “I didn’t realise that I had won the match until I saw my box all jumping around and celebrating. In your mind, you think, ‘Well I’ve got to continue playing’, but then I saw my dad raise his arms in the air. That’s when it kind of hit me, ‘Okay, we’ve done it. We’ve achieved it. We are Grand Slam champions’.”

Zverev’s major breakthrough came after he had already put in well more than a decade’s hard work on the ATP Tour. He played in qualifying at a tour-level event as early as age 14 (in Metz in 2011), and he had racked up 548 career wins before even stepping on court at 2026 Roland Garros.

The roster of high-profile names that sent congratulations his way in the wake of his victory represents an acknowledgement of something undeniable: Zverev’s Grand Slam breakthrough was hard-earned. Among the well-wishers was a man who knows all too well what it takes to claim the Roland Garros crown: record-14-time champion Rafael Nadal.

“[The congratulatory messages were] special, but for me it was even more special that Rafa was texting me throughout the French Open and was kind of really paying attention,” Zverev revealed. “That is even more special to me… For me what stood out is also the Billie Jean King tweet, I loved that one. A lot of great athletes, great people congratulating me and that feels special.”

Given Nadal’s standout record at the clay major, was there any advice being passed on as Zverev progressed through the draw?

“No. It was more that he was hoping I would win and that kind of thing,” said Zverev, whose wider Roland Garros story will forever be intertwined with the iconic Spanish lefty: The pair memorably duelled for more than three hours in the 2022 semi-finals before Zverev retired due to a serious ankle injury with the match in a second-set tie-break.

Zverev entered Sunday’s clash against Cobolli with an 0-3 record in major finals. Those defeats (in 2021, 2024 and 2025) were spread across five seasons, and Zverev admitted that his previous championship-match heartbreak had sometimes left him wondering if he would ever fulfil the Grand Slam-winning potential he had long been touted as having.

“Childhood me was a lot more confident [I would win a major] than me right now,” he said. “It took a long time, but it made it even sweeter, I think. Achieving it here, especially in Paris — where I’ve had a lot of difficult moments and a lot of heartbreak, injury as well — to achieve it on that court is the most special feeling.”

Germany is a tennis-loving country with a long history of hosting big tournaments and producing top-class talent. Yet Zverev is just the fifth German, male or female, to lift a major trophy in the Open Era. The big-serving Hamburg native spoke proudly about adding to his homeland’s tennis legacy.

“We have a very rich tennis history, obviously with Boris Becker and Steffi Graf leading the way,” Zverev said. “We had a lot of great success on the women’s side in recent years, with Angie Kerber and a lot of Top-10 players on the women’s side. But on the men’s side, we’ve struggled a bit more since Boris and Michael [Stich].

“We had great players, like Tommy Haas, [Nicolas] Kiefer, [Rainer] Schuettler, but nobody could ever achieve winning a Grand Slam. I feel like the nation was really waiting for it, waiting like, ‘When is it going to happen?’ It’s been 30 years since the last Grand Slam champion from Germany and I’m just happy to be able to give them one. That’s the most important thing."

As ever in the fast-paced world of tennis, Zverev has only a relatively limited timeframe in which to cherish his Roland Garros triumph. As well as carrying out some obligations for sponsors, he must also quickly start preparing for his next tournament, on a completely different surface: He will next compete at the Terra Wortmann Open in Halle, which begins on 15 June.

"I will not practise for a couple of days, but I have to go to Germany,” Zverev said when asked about his plans for his first week as a major champion. “I have to do my duties now, and then on Thursday I’ll be in Halle practising already preparing for the next tournament. This is our life, this is tennis.”