![\"Cousins](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/vacherot-rinderknech-texas-a-m.jpg\")
<\/p>\n Shanghai
\n Inside Rinderknech & Vacherot’s journey from college tennis to the Shanghai final<\/p>\n
ATPTour.com speaks exclusively to Texas A&M Head Coach Steve Denton<\/p>\n
October 12, 2025<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Kevin O’Shea\/Texas A&M Athletics<\/p>\n
Cousins Arthur Rinderknech and Valentin Vacherot played college tennis together at Texas A&M University.
\n By Andrew Eichenholz<\/p>\n
In 2018 the Texas A&M University men\u2019s tennis team suffered a heartbreaking 4-3 loss in the semi-finals of the NCAA Championships to Wake Forest University. Arthur Rinderknech<\/a> played No. 2 singles for A&M while his cousin, Valentin Vacherot<\/a>, competed at No. 4 singles. Their matches were side by side on that difficult day, which marked the end of Rinderknech\u2019s accomplished college tennis career.<\/p>\n Head coach Steve Denton<\/a>, the two-time Australian Open<\/a> finalist, still remembers what Rinderknech said to him in the aftermath of that loss.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen Arthur left to go out to try to go play [professionally], I remember him saying to me, \u2018Steve, make sure that you take care of my cousin like you took care of me\u2019,” Denton told ATPTour.com. \u201cI said, \u2018Absolutely, I’ll do that\u2019.\u201d <\/p>\n Denton has maintained his relationship with the cousins, who on Sunday will meet for ATP Masters 1000 glory in the final of the Rolex Shanghai Masters<\/a>. They each defeated a former No. 1 player in the PIF ATP Rankings \u2014 Rinderknech ousted Daniil Medvedev<\/a> and Vacherot beat Novak Djokovic<\/a> \u2014 in the semi-finals.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a dream come true for these two guys,\u201d Denton said. \u201cThey’ve taken the road maybe not traveled as much, obviously, and unless you’re a freak like a [Jannik] Sinner and [Carlos] Alcaraz, a lot of players have to go through all these things in order to get to where they are.\u201d<\/p>\n The college coach has been waking up in the middle of the night to watch his former players playing in China. It has been a thrilling experience for Denton, who wanted to travel to Shanghai for the final. However, by the time the former Aggies reached the championship match, there were no flights that would arrive on time.<\/p>\n \u201cI went to sleep last night and it was very improbable that Valentin Vacherot<\/a> was going to beat Novak Djokovic<\/a>,\u201d Denton said. \u201cArthur has been playing really well, and he’s very confident, but still, Medvedev is a former number one player in the world and for Arthur to be able to win that match and then get to play each other in the finals is just an amazing story.\u201d<\/p>\n Denton traveled to France when Rinderknech was still a junior to watch three or four players and gauge his interest in them. After watching Arthur for two minutes, the former singles World No. 12 and doubles World No. 2 knew which player he wanted.<\/p>\n When Rinderknech first arrived on campus at Texas A&M, the Frenchman was unable to compete for a year because he was ineligible. The character he showed that year stuck with the longtime coach.<\/p>\n \u201cHe suffered watching the other guys play,\u201d Denton said. \u201cAnd I think that suffering that he went through really helped him in a lot of respects, molded him into being this selfless leader.\u201d<\/p>\n You May Also Like: Cousins Rinderknech & Vacherot living ‘undreamable dream’: Who will win Shanghai final?<\/a><\/p>\n It was all about the team for Rinderknech in an individual sport. Fast forward to Saturday when he lost the first set in the semi-finals against Medvedev. A career-best run was nearing an end against the 2019 Shanghai champion and in the moment, the 30-year-old was not fully focused on winning the match, but trying to help wear down Medvedev so he would be exhausted Sunday in the final against his cousin.<\/p>\n \u201cThat’s the kind of kid he is. He’s always been a team player for us,\u201d Denton said. \u201cHe was a team player, and he kind of hung in there in that match thinking, \u2018Well, if I can’t win, maybe I can take Medvedev\u2019s legs away from him a little bit by staying out here and giving Val a better chance\u2019. And they both think that way. They both have a lot of humility. They both are very team oriented and clearly even more so than that, they are family oriented.\u201d<\/p>\n That is a big reason why Vacherot ended up playing at Texas A&M, even if Denton had no idea Rinderknech had a cousin \u2014 let alone such a good tennis player \u2014 early on. <\/p>\n \u201cAfter the first year and me having a good relationship with him and him loving it here, I think he thought, \u2018Okay, this is a good spot for my cousin, I’m going to look out for him and I’m going to make sure he comes here\u2019,\u201d Denton said. \u201cAnd that’s what happened.\u201d<\/p>\n The pair overlapped for two seasons and helped take the programme to its greatest heights. Rinderknech was more confident and outgoing compared to Vacherot, who was \u201cpretty reserved\u201d. But both proved great leaders, just in their own style. It has been special to watch their dramatic breakthrough from afar.<\/p>\n \u201cYou tell young players and their families that you’re going to take care of them and that you’re going to help them to try to go play pro tennis,\u201d Denton said. \u201cAnd so by doing that, you have to continue to stay involved in their game. And I’ve been involved with their game from the beginning, and as long as they want me to help them, I’m happy to do it.\u201d <\/p>\n Although Denton will not be in Shanghai, he is eager to turn on the match in the early hours of Sunday morning in Texas to watch his Aggies battle in just the second ATP Masters 1000 final between former college tennis players in series history (since 1990). Mikael Pernfors<\/a> (Georgia) beat Todd Martin<\/a> (Northwestern) in the 1993 Canada final.<\/p>\n \u201cThere are lots of exciting stories about tennis, but this story, at this time, is I think as good as any this year,\u201d Denton said. \u201cAnd what I’m excited about is these two guys have basically told the rest of the world that college tennis is a definite pathway to the Tour.\u201d <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Shanghai Inside Rinderknech & Vacherot’s journey from college tennis to the Shanghai final ATPTour.com speaks exclusively to Texas…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":206769,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":{"0":"post-206768","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=206768"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/206768\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/206769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=206768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=206768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=206768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}