Andy Roddick thinks Alexander Zverev may have become "too focused" on beating Carlos Alcaraz or Jannik Sinner after his latest Grand Slam final defeat and that's why his form has been subpar for the past two months and he started to losing to players that he would usually beat.
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For the start of 2025, the German's big goal was to become a Slam champion at the Australian Open. And he put himself just one win away from accomplishing that but then was hit by a cold shower in the final after Sinner dominated him in three sets.
Since then, Zverev has gone just 4-3 and has picked up a couple of early exits. The list of players that have managed to upset the world No. 2 over the last month a half includes Francisco Cerundolo, Francisco Comesana, Learner Tien and Tallon Griekspoor. It is not hard to realize that the 27-year-old hasn't been looking like his usual self since the opening Slam of the year.
Roddick suspects Zverev may be battling the same thing he went through in 2006
After losing to Roger Federer in back-to-back Wimbledon finals in 2004 and 2005, the American became obsessed with figuring out how to beat the Swiss - that led to his overall form dropping.
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I was in a mode for a while, where 100% of my focus was adjusting my game to try to beat Roger, and then all of a sudden I found myself, the first part of 2006 where I was losing to a bunch of people who werent Roger," the American tennis legend said on the Served with Andy Roddick.
"Right, because my focus was there, I sense a lot of that with him where I think hes taking potshots on his forehand side now, where its like oh thats not what you want to do. I feel like thats for the chorus."
While Roddick went on to lose to Federer in the 2006 US Open final and the 2009 Wimbledon final, he still finished with a Grand Slam since he won the 2003 US Open.
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In Zverev's case, there is no guarantee that he will land a Major unless he figures out how to finally make that one last step.
