Arthur Fils, Carlos Alcaraz and Andrey Rublev (Getty Images) Dubai: The lines blur for today’s top tennis pros, the chalk marks blur the clean cuts of the fashion world.Arthur Fils, the 21-year-old ranked 34th on the ATP Tour, recently signed with luxury fashion house Balenciaga. The talented Frenchman, who pulled out of the Dubai Duty Free tennis tournament with a strained hip, spends up to 15 minutes in front of his wardrobe deciding what to have for dinner.“I take this, this and this and the mix always works. I’m pretty simple. I don’t want to do crazy things,” he told TOI in an exclusive chat about his choices, which are not too different from what he does on court. “Tennis is much more open now. More new brands are coming into the sport, we’re also signing deals with luxury brands. We’re invited to a lot of events and there’s a lot more media now.”In the Carlos Alcaraz–Jannik Sinner era, forehand meets fashion collaboration, global luxury powerhouses walk alongside sports brands expanding into the field of sports. The game’s new icons aren’t just a trophy hunt; they set the tone for a generation that sees tennis as an atmosphere and a lifestyle as much as a grind and a legacy.If the Roger Federer–Rafael Nadal–Novak Djokovic years were defined by chiseled perfection, the Alcaraz–Sinner era is all about expression.Alexander Bublik, second seed at the Dubai Duty Free Tennis Championships, points to age. He is 16 years younger than Federer and more than a decade younger than Nadal and Djokovic. Bublík, 28, ranked No. 10, was already on Tour when Alcaraz, 22, and Sinner, 24, showed up.“For me, it was about looking up to them,” Bublík said of the golden generation. “We are not friends, we will not be friends. With Carlos and Jannik, it is a friendly relationship. Carlos is a funny guy, very, very loud. He wears crazy clothes and Jannik is more stylish and elegant, he has an icy attitude on the court.”Bublík, who noted that those were much cooler times than the results-oriented parts of the game’s golden era, said he even had film offers back home in Kazakhstan or Russia.Andrey Rublev, whose unruly mop reflects his temperament, calls it “a generational thing.”“Every generation has had to deal with something,” he said. “Before Roger and Rafa, it was Sampras and Agassi; before that, it was McEnroe and Borg. It was a different time, without social media. They were doing a lot more things off the court. In the era of Roger and Rafa, social media started and tennis became more professional as well. The players were more locked in, super-professional.”“Now there’s a new generation, like the TikTok generation, so it’s just different,” said the 28-year-old Russian.In turn, Fils admires the unapologetically expressive style of Formula 1 champion Lewis Hamilton.“Lewis Hamilton’s style has a lot of character. Wherever he goes, everyone looks at him because of what he’s wearing; it looks great on him. I like fashion and now I can wear a lot of cool things that I really like. So every time I go out to dinner or whatever, I try to wear something cool.”In a sport once defined by white men and restraint, self-expression is no longer secondary; is part of the main event. The new generation is just as comfortable fronting fashion campaigns as it is trading punches from the baseline, unafraid to let personality sit alongside performance.For the likes of Fils and his peers, style is not a distraction but a statement. The forehand is still talking, but more and more so is the fit.
