Features Player
#NextGenATP Engel inspired by Nadal and when he chose tennis
The 17-year-old German won his ATP Tour debut on Monday in Almaty
October 15, 2024
Andrey Udartsev/KTF.kz
Justin Engel celebrates after defeating Coleman Wong on Monday at the Almaty Open.
Written by Andy West
Rafael Nadal’s illustrious playing career may be coming to an end, but the Spaniard’s legacy will likely continue to inspire future generations of ATP Tour stars. Just ask Justin Engel.
On Monday, Engel defeated Coleman Wong at the Almaty Open to become the first player born in 2007 or later to win an ATP Tour match. The #NextGenATP German, making his tour-level debut as a wild card, saved nine of 10 break points he faced against Wong. It was a display of resilience under pressure that his tennis hero would be proud of.
“Rafa has always been my idol,” Engel told ATPTour.com ahead of his second-round meeting with Francisco Cerundolo at the Kazakhstan ATP 250. fight and everything. He was my favorite player since I was little.
“On the court, mentally and everything, I can say that I am not [exactly] like Nadal, because we are all different, but I always fight and push. I was always a fighter on the court.”
Making history 🙌
17-year-old Justin Engel becomes the first player born in 2007 or later to record an ATP Tour victory!
Read about it all 👇
– ATP Tour (@atptour) October 14, 2024
Monday’s win against Wong was a reward for the hard work that Engel and his father (and coach) Horst have put in since he was three years old. The German also did professional boxing between the ages of eight and 12, but says some early success with a racquet in hand convinced him that tennis was his future.
“I started playing when I was three years old in Nuremberg with my father,” Engel recalled. “But I was inspired to play tennis [seriously] because I won tournaments and that gave me a good feeling. I won the Under 11 national championship, which was special for me, because it was the third tournament I ever played in my life.”
Away from tennis, Engel is a huge fan of soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo and basketball star LeBron James, and enjoys watching the TV series The Walking Dead and listening to The Weeknd. He is also multilingual: in addition to German, he speaks English and Romanian and can understand Russian.
“I lived for three years in Moldova with my grandparents, so I speak Romanian,” explains Engel. “I also understand everything in Russian, but I can’t speak it anymore. I forgot.
“I was closer to Moldova than Germany at one point, from the age of two to five. When I turned five, I returned to Germany and went to school. At first I had a hard time at school in Germany, because I couldn’t speak German well.”
Engel, who lives and trains in his hometown of Nuremburg, may have only turned 17 two weeks ago, but he still has a good idea of the highs and lows of competitive tennis. After struggling for good results in 2023 and early 2024, he won his first ITF World Tennis Tour event in May in Villach, Austria. He has won three more ITF titles since then, and earlier this month earned his first ATP Challenger Tour victory to reach the quarter-finals at the event in Villena, Spain.
Engel’s surge has been reflected in his incredible rise in the PIF ATP Rankings. Outside the Top 1200 as recently as May, the 17-year-old rose 63 spots to No. 395 in the PIF ATP Live Rankings after defeating Wong in Almaty.
“Last year and at the beginning of this year, I was unlucky with games. “I always lose in the third set for the juniors,” said Engel. “I trained a lot and it didn’t work in these competitions. I didn’t win many games.
“Then, suddenly I won that Futures tournament in Austria, and suddenly everything happened for me. I won a lot of games and gained confidence. I was very surprised that it happened like this.”
