Team GB Davis Cup star Jack Draper stars at the Ultimate Tennis Showdown grand final for £430k Christmas payday as tennis rips up rulebook in London

• Jack Draper competed in the Ultimate Tennis Showdown in London on Sunday
• The Englishman was rewarded with a £430,000 Christmas payday
• Draper went unbeaten across three days of tennis at the exhibition event 

Jack Draper ended up delighted that he interrupted his off-season training regime to accept the invitation to London’s grand final of the Ultimate Tennis Showdown.

On Sunday night, he not only topped the eight-man field of tennis’s answer to The Hundred, but gave himself some handy Christmas spending money by taking away £431,000 from the Excel Arena for three days’ work that saw him go unbeaten.

Amid a cacophony of music and flashing lights, he defeated world number eight Holger Rune in the final by virtue of winning three of the frenetic eight-minute quarters to one in this revolutionary, time-limited format.

An exhibition it may have been, but he produced some scintillating tennis to take the last quarter 19-7, having earlier overcome Norway’s Casper Ruud in the semi-finals.

The biggest payday of his career was only earned by beating some outstanding opposition, including the exceptional young Dane Rune. Notably, the 21 year-old appeared to last better towards the end of the non-stop quarters which clearly push players to their limits.

English tennis ace Jack Draper won Ultimate Tennis Showdown grand final on Sunday

Draper was rewarded with a huge £431k Christmas payday after winning the exhibition event

‘It’s a really fun event, they did an amazing job,’ said Draper, who was advertised as being ‘Straight Outta Surrey.’

The GB number four, who begins his new season in Adelaide next month, added: ‘In this format ( which has a maximum 15 seconds between the one serve allowed) it’s difficult to stay consistent but I think I did a good job of that.’

Rune made it through to the final thanks to a win over Andrey Rublev which saw the Russian angrily mount the umpire’s chair after a dispute over who had called first for their ‘bonus card’, a joker which triples the value of a chosen point.

In an event which tolerates more outlandish behaviour, and encourages players to show their emotions, he angrily remonstrated. That included going over to the event’s promoter, the French coach and entrepreneur Patrick Mouratoglou.

The Dane, who can also be volatile, concluded that the whole thing had become a ‘s**tshow’, but it was all grist to the mill and, of course, the normal ATP rulebook is nowhere to be seen.

There has certainly been much to engage the fan over three days, and the clientele had a younger hue to it than you might see it at a more orthodox tennis event in the UK or anywhere else. 

While a modest size arena was chosen for this first outing to London – it has been tried out in major cities elsewhere – a total of 14,000 people turned up over three days despite the promotion being fairly minimal.

Draper (left) defeated world number eight Holger Rune in the final by virtue of winning three of the frenetic eight-minute quarters to one in this revolutionary, time-limited format

The appetite for something different appears to be there, although it is difficult to see how at this point the tournament could be running at anything other than a substantial loss, given the levels of prize money.

Nonetheless Mouratoglou was definitely happy with this first visit to Europe’s most global city: ‘I think we’ve had an incredible three days. The crowd has been unbelievable, there has been so much energy – everyone feels it, not just us as organisers but the players too. 

‘That connection between the crowd and the players is one of the keys to UTS and it has worked incredibly well here. We’ve had great feedback from business, from TV, from media and I’m so happy with that. That’s what we do this for, to show tennis in a different way and hopefully bring a lot of new fans on board. 

I think it was a great move to come here. I would love to come back to London. I love the city but more than anything, the atmosphere is great and I think it could get bigger and bigger here.’

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