The tennis schedule has been generating some controversy in recent times, with players expressing concerns about the current structure and its impact their well-being and the overall quality of the sport. “Obviously it is not our decision, but for sure I think we have too many tournaments in the season. It’s not going to end well,” Iga Swiatek told Sky Sports after her quarter-final win at Cincinnati last year. On the men’s side, in an interview with Punto de Break, even Carlos Alcaraz warned how more and more players would choose to opt out of tournaments “because they have to take care of their bodies, families, and other aspects of life besides tennis.” Taylor Fritz, too, has had his own thoughts.

This year, we’ve already seen quite a few changes in the North American hard swing. For instance, under the scheduling expansion plan of most ATP Masters 1000 tournaments, the 2025 Canadian Open is now being held for over 12 days. This change has now reduced the time gap between Wimbledon and North American hard-court events. As a result of this, there have been plenty of superstars, including Carlos Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner, Novak Djokovic, Aryna Sabalenka, and a few more, who have opted to pull out their names from the Canadian Open this year. American tennis star Taylor Fritz, too, has labeled the tennis schedule “insane” and has also called for the season to be shortened to reduce the number of big-name withdrawals from these events.

Talking about the controversial 12-day Masters 1000 format, he said, “To be honest, I am complaining about the length of the two-week tournaments, but at the same time, I don’t dislike playing a match and having a day off and playing a match.” It’s pretty much a “weird” situation for someone like Fritz. Before the 2025 Citi Open, he said, “It’s a tough time of year because there’s no week where it makes sense to take a break. Don’t get me wrong — I really like Washington and I like playing the tournament — but with how tight my grass-court schedule was, I probably should have skipped it.” He believes this mandate unfairly limits players’ ability to manage their workload ahead of the majors. Seeing this rising concern about the scheduling issues, especially during the North American swing, renowned journalist Ben Rothenberg shared a tweet recently asking for experts’ take on this. Seeing that post, former ATP pro John Isner shared it on his own X handle with the caption, “It’s so bad.”

Recently, Spanish tennis star Alejandro Davidovich Fokina expressed his disappointment with scheduling issues of the Canadian Open, claiming the ATP always promises they’ll fix things, but nothing ever changes. Even Leylah Fernandez didn’t look too pleased with these schedules as she had to travel to Montreal to play in her home tournament just 48 hours after winning the title at the Citi Open. On July 21, during the ‘Served’ podcast, Andy Roddick and Jon Wertheim also spoke on this issue, and they didn’t look too pleased with this situation.

Jon Wertheim even stated, “These players are not robots!” However, despite his unhappiness with the schedules, Taylor Fritz has kept his form intact, as he has now secured a spot in the QF of the 2025 Canadian Open.

Taylor Fritz shares his thoughts after securing his spot in the QF of the Canadian Open

This has been full of ups and downs for Taylor Fritz. After he made it to the final at the 2024 US Open, everyone expected a deeper run from him at the AO, but he was knocked out of the first major tournament of this season in the third round by Gael Monfils. Even at the ‘Sunshine Doubles’, he failed to win the title this year. The clay court season was also horrible for Fritz, and he was knocked out of the French Open in the first round. But things started to change for him at the grass swing. At first, he defeated Alexander Zverev to win the Boss Open and then went on to lift another title (Eastbourne Open) before making it to the semifinals at the Wimbledon Championships.

Fritz has carried forward that momentum at the North American hard-court swing, and after making it to the QF of the Citi Open, he has now also reached the QF of the Canadian Open. In his hard-fought 7-6(4),6-7 (5),7-6(5) win over Jiri Lehecka, Taylor Fritz saved all nine break points against him while Jiri Lehecka could save only five. Fritz also hit 16 aces in this match and committed 5 double faults. “I think just in the end [it was about] really accepting what was there for me tonight. Luckily for me, I was serving really, really well tonight. He was, too,” he said after the match.

What’s more? Fritz has now secured a spot in the list of 11 active players (including Novak Djokovic, Carlos Alcaraz, and others) who have reached the last eight at every Masters event. Reacting to this astonishing feat, he stated, “It’s really cool. It shows the consistency on all the different tournaments and surfaces. I guess what’s next is to go for semis.”

All he now needs to do is put up a similar performance against Andrey Rublev in the SF. Interestingly, Taylor Fritz has reached the semifinals in six of the nine Masters 1000s, all but Rome, Cincinnati, and Paris. But do you think he can beat Rublev in the next match?