ByHarry PooleBBC Sport journalist<\/p>\n
Updated 27 minutes ago<\/p>\n
British number one Jack Draper suffered a second-round loss to Frenchman Arthur Rinderknech on his return to the ATP Tour at the Dubai Tennis Championships.<\/p>\n
Contesting his first event on the men's tour since the US Open six months ago, Draper marked his comeback from injury by beating Quentin Halys in straight sets<\/a> on Monday.<\/p>\n But the 24-year-old's tournament was ended by world number 31 Rinderknech in a 7-5 6-7 (4-7) 6-4 loss two days later.<\/p>\n Draper has slipped to 15th in the world, after reaching a career-high ranking of fourth last summer, following his long-term absence caused by a bruised bone in his service arm.<\/p>\n The issue, which began during the clay-court swing last April, progressively worsened to the point that he was forced to withdraw before his second-round match at the US Open in August – and subsequently finished his 2025 season.<\/p>\n Draper ended his 164-day wait to make his return to competition when he played – and won – one match for Great Britain at this month's Davis Cup qualifiers.<\/p>\n Draper said he was "really proud" to make a winning return to the tour following "a lot of down moments [during] the last eight months".<\/p>\n Seeking to build on the victory over the 68th-ranked Halys, Draper made an assured start on serve as he lost just two points across his opening four games.<\/p>\n But he crucially failed to take his first two break points in the 11th game, before Rinderknech seized his opportunity to clinch the opening set in the following game.<\/p>\n Draper was the first to come under pressure in the second set as he withstood three break points to restore parity at 3-3 but, from the brink of trailing by a set and a break, he reset impressively. <\/p>\n The Briton lost just one point over his next three service games and would not relinquish control of the tie-break after winning four of the first five points.<\/p>\n However, it was Rinderknech who forced the breakthrough in the deciding set – with that proving enough to secure a quarter-final meeting with Russian fifth seed Andrey Rublev.<\/p>\n ByJonathan Jurejko<\/a>BBC Sport tennis news reporter<\/p>\n In his opening match, Draper had enough quality to see off Halys. He did not possess quite enough sharpness against Rinderknech.<\/p>\n Draper was again wearing a compression sleeve on the affected left arm, although a string of winners from his dominant side – including an eye-catching 100mph forehand which whipped past Rinderknech – showed he was not afraid of holding back.<\/p>\n The Briton has also switched to a platform serve, meaning he stands with his feet slightly wider to allow a smoother transfer of weight, in an attempt to alleviate pressure on the bothersome bruised humerus.<\/p>\n That illustrates how Draper knows he needs to continue managing the issue.<\/p>\n Draper will be pleased how he pushed a tuned-up Rinderknech until the very end, even though he was unable to create opportunities on his opponent's rock-solid service game.<\/p>\n Rinderknech's variation and precision on a quick surface was hard to cope with. But Draper's lack of recent court time also showed in some rusty returning as the match reached its critical stage.<\/p>\n Once the feeling of frustration which inevitably follows any defeat subsides, Draper will reflect positively on the strides he has made in Dubai – assuming he recovers without any major issues.<\/p>\n Next he heads to Indian Wells – to defend the biggest title of his career – with valuable court time in the bank and the first step of a comeback likely to require patience completed.<\/p>\n Live scores, results and order of play<\/p>\n <\/a><\/li>\n Get tennis news sent straight to your phone<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Britain's Draper beaten by Rinderknech in DubaiImage source, Getty ImagesImage caption, Jack Draper won the prestigious Masters 1,000 title at Indian Wells last yearByHarry PooleBBC Sport journal…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":8585,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-decor"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8584\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8585"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp1.niviyo.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Positives to take from Draper's tour comeback – analysis<\/h2>\n
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