Michael Mmoh (/moʊ/MOH;[3] born January 10, 1998) is an American professional tennis player.
Mmoh has a career-high ATP singles ranking of No. 81 achieved on September 11, 2023 and a doubles ranking of No. 265 achieved on April 12, 2021. He won the USTA junior national championship in 2016.
Personal life
Born in Saudi Arabia, where he lived until the age of 13, Mmoh has both Irish and Nigerian ancestry. Michael's father Tony Mmoh was also a professional tennis player who represented Nigeria and reached a career-high ranking of No.105. His mother was born in Ireland and is also an Australian citizen. Mmoh's parents named him after basketball superstar Michael Jordan.
Mmoh began playing tennis at age 3. He trains at the IMG Academy in Florida.[4]
Mmoh enjoyed early success on the ITF Futures tour, winning three titles before turning 18.
2016–17: ATP, Grand Slam and top 200 debut
In February 2016, Mmoh qualified for his first ATP-level tournament at Memphis by defeating fellow Americans Dennis Novikov and Bjorn Fratangelo. He then lost in the first round to eventual finalist Taylor Fritz, the highest ranked American teenager at the time. Following his fourth Futures title, Mmoh was awarded a wildcard into the Miami Masters, where he lost to Alexander Zverev, the top-ranked 18 year-old in the world, after dropping two tiebreaks.
In September 2016, Mmoh broke into the top 300 for the first time by reaching the final of the ATP Challenger event at Tiburon as a qualifier.
In November 2016, he reached the Top 200 and also won the 2017 Australian Open Wild Card Challenge largely by winning his first career Challenger title at Knoxville.
He would claim another Challenger title the following summer in August 2017 at Lexington.
2018: Top 100, First ATP wins & quarterfinals, Masters third round
At the 2018 Miami Open he reached the third round as a qualifier for the first time at a Masters level defeating 12th seed Roberto Bautista Agut for his first top-15 win and the biggest of his career.[6]
He entered the main draw at the 2018 Wimbledon Championships for the first time at this Grand Slam as a lucky loser. He reached the top 100 at World No. 97 on 1 October 2018.
2019–20: First Grand Slam win
In January 2019, Mmoh qualified for the first time via ranking in a Grand Slam main draw at the 2019 Australian Open where he lost in the first round to Radu Albot.
At the 2020 Australian Open, Mmoh recorded his first main draw victory with a straight sets win over Pablo Andújar as a wildcard. Following his Australian Open performance, Mmoh qualified for the main draw at the 2020 US Open, where he won his first round match against João Sousa in four sets, and also at the 2020 French Open, where he lost in the first round.
In 2022, he entered the 2022 U.S. Men's Clay Court Championships as a lucky loser directly into the second round replacing top seed Casper Ruud who withdrew in the last minute. He won his first match defeating Sam Querrey to reach the quarterfinals[8] but withdrew due to injury.[9]
Mmoh won a wildcard entry into the main draw at the 2022 French Open by winning the Roland Garros wildcard challenge.[10]
2023: Best season: Two Major third rounds, fourth ATP quarterfinal, top 85
Mmoh's first tournament of the year was in Pune, where he defeated local wildcard Manas Dhamne in the first round[11] before losing to the 6th seed, Filip Krajinović in the second round.[12]
He then entered the 2023 Australian Open as a lucky loser after the withdrawal of David Goffin and won his first round match, defeating fellow qualifier French Laurent Lokoli, after saving a match point in the third set. He then defeated 12th seed Alexander Zverev in the second round.[13][14] He became the fifth player to make it as a lucky loser to the third round; the furthest a lucky loser had made it at this Major is the fourth round (Stéphane Robert in 2014).[15] As a result he moved up 25 positions back into the top 100 to a new career-high singles ranking of No. 83 on 30
January 2023.[16]
In February, he lost in the first round at the Dallas Open to eventual champion Yibing Wu. The following week, he reached the round of 16 at the Delray Beach Open by defeating wildcard Aleksandar Kovacevic in three sets.[17] He then reached the quarterfinals after upsetting third seed Denis Shapovalov, also in three sets.[18] As a result, he reached a new career high ranking of No. 82 on 20 February 2023.
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