De Minaur’s 2025 was in equal measure great and frustrating. He had the best season of his career so far, repeatedly going deep in big events, but invariably failed in the most crucial matches against better opposition. It was the ultimate gatekeeping season, with de Minaur generally too good for lower ranked players but not quite good enough against top 10 level opponents.

First Australian Open quarterfinal

While de Minaur was surely happy to have finally reached a quarterfinal at his home Slam, and doing so with relative ease, he had a miserable time against Jannik Sinner, winning only six games and being completely dominated. His inability to challenge Sinner was already a problem in previous year and would turn out to be a recurrent problem in 2025 as well.

Back to back Rotterdam finals

De Minaur then reached a second consecutive final at Rotterdam, dominating all his opponents on the way there, not dropping a set or even being taken to a tiebreak. In the final, however, he put up a good fight but lost to Carlos Alcaraz in three sets. His inability to beat the Spaniard has also always been a huge problem for De Minaur and 2025 was no different.

In Doha, he made the quarterfinals, losing a very close third set tiebreak to eventual champion Andrey Rublev, and then lost his opening match in Dubai to Marin Cilic. Indian Wells and Miami have never been happy hunting grounds for him and this year was no difference, but two round of 16 losses to Francisco Cerundolo and Matteo Berrettini. The highlight was probably his victory over João Fonseca in a fantastic match where de Minaur’s consistency barely overcame Fonseca’s firepower.

A good but frustrating clay season

De Minaur showed a fantastic level of tennis in Monte Carlo, beating Daniil Medvedev 6-2 6-2 and then double bagelling Grigor Dimitrov in the quarterfinals, one of the most stunning ATP results of the year. He carried on this great form in the first set of his semifinal, taking it 6-1 against Lorenzo Musetti, but then he couldn’t sustain it and ended up losing in the third set tiebreak.

The following week in Barcelona he once against dominated his opponents en route to the quarterfinals but then ran into Carlos Alcaraz and lost in straight sets. In Madrid he won his first two rounds easily again but then lost to Musetti again, this time in straights. In Rome, it was Tommy Paul who stopped his run in the last 16, a very disappointing results considering that De Minaur led the head-to-head 5-0.

At Roland Garros he was up 6-2 6-2 on Alexander Bublik in the second round, but got completely overpowered afterwards and lost in five sets. Given what Bublik accomplished in that tournament and the rest of the season, the loss isn’t as awful as his ranking of #62 at the time would suggest, but it was still undoubtedly frustrating.

Tough draws on grass

De Minaur got a very rough draw at Queen’s, losing to eventual finalist Jiri Lehecka in the first round and another very rough one at Wimbledon, drawing Novak Djokovic in the fourth round. He won the first set 6-1 but eventually his serve was simply too easy to exploit, and he ended up losing in four sets.

Washington title followed by more frustration in the US hardcourt season

The highest point of de Minaur’s season came in Washington, where he won his only title of the season and tenth of his career. That said, he greatly benefitted from Dadidovich Fokina’s nerves at the prospect of winning the first title of his career; the Spaniard led 5-2 in the third set and wasted three match points. It was still the high point of De Minaur’s season all things considered.

The following week at Canada he had a great chance to maybe finally win a Masters 1000 title and seemed to be playing great tennis, but he hit a wall against the eventual champion Ben Shelton in the quarterfinals. He then went on to lose his first match in Cincinnati against Reilly Opelka, another disappointing result considering he led the head-to-head 5-o going into the match.

Finally, the biggest disappointment of the season arguably came at the US Open. De Minaur had a great draw to get into the quarterfinals and won the first set against Felix Auger-Aliassime; he was then a break up in the second set and had set point and was a break up in the fourth set as well, but he simply couldn’t execute in the biggest moments against an opponent who wasn’t playing his best tennis either. It was De Minaur’s best opportunity to finally reach a Slam semifinal but he was unable to capitalize on it.

More “close but no cigar” to end the season

In Asia, de Minaur started by reaching the semifinals in Beijing, where he finally won a set against Jannik Sinner. He then found himself in an excellent position in Shanghai, with a very far from his best Daniil Medvedev, Arthur Rinderknech and Valentin Vacherot as his route to a potential first Masters 1000 title. But he put up a very lackluster performance against Medvedev and wasted yet another opportunity.

The indoor season was more of the same; he played great in Vienna until he ran into Sinner in the semifinals and lost in straights and he lost another extremely close quarterfinal in Paris against Bublik. He made it to the ATP Finals and while he posted a 1-3 record there, losing yet against to Alcaraz, Musetti and Sinner, his one win over Taylor Fritz was his only top 10 win of the year and was enough to secure a semifinal spot.

Going into 2026, it seems likely that de Minaur will remain a top 10 player and go consistently deep in big events, but the big challenge is whether he can finally start getting some important wins when it really counts.

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