"Many years with depression" - Andrey Rublev lays bare his mental health struggles as he reaches his 1st Canadian Open final

Andrey Rublev recently made a vulnerable admission about dealing with depression. The Russian, who is competing at the 2024 Canadian Open, said he “started to explode” this season after years of struggle.

Rublev reached his maiden Canadian Open final on Sunday, August 11, by avenging his third-round French Open defeat to Matteo Arnaldi. The Russian won the match 6-4, 6-2. Prior to that, he also beat Tomas Etcheverry, Brandon Nakashima and defending champion Jannik Sinner.

After his 6-3, 1-6, 6-2 quarterfinal win against Sinner on Saturday, Andrey Rublev was asked about his on-court struggles this season. Out of his 15 losses so far in 2024, the former World No. 5 has suffered six opening-match defeats, while three others came in the early stages of tournaments.

In February, Rublev was disqualified from the Dubai Tennis Championships semifinal after lashing out at a line umpire. In recent months, he has also received immense backlash from the tennis community over his "self-harming" behavior on the court.

Rublev said on Saturday that he was suffering mentally. He revealed that his frustrations snowballed in recent months after years of depression.

"Mentally I was out of order. I don't know how you can say it. (I was struggling with) everything," Andrey Rublev said in his Canadian Open press conference. "I guess it was already long moment of everything, and I started to burn out because I was struggling for many years with depression, with many things outside of the court."

"I guess this year is when I couldn't handle it anymore, and it starts to just explode. It started to explode more and more on the court because in life I was able to stay calm, but inside the court I was burning everything," he added. "In the end, yeah, I was struggling. Now last months I feel really good, and straight away tennis is better."

Despite his mental health struggles and an otherwise poor run of form, Rublev has added two titles to his cabinet so far in 2024 – at the Hong Kong Open and the Madrid Open. At the Masters 1000 event in the Spanish capital he staged a miraculous run, beating defending champion Carlos Alcaraz en route, all while suffering from tonsillitis.

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Andrey Rublev in pursuit of a third Masters 1000 title at Canadian Open 2024

Andrey Rublev pictured at the 2024 Canadian Open in Montreal - Source: Getty

It should be noted that before his run to the Montreal title clash, Andrey Rublev had won just one match at the Canadian Open in his career, in 2021 (Toronto).

The Russian’s exceptional display in reaching his sixth Masters 1000 final has thus come as a surprise to many. He is also the only player this season to have reached two 1000 finals, knocking out the defending champions both times—Jannik Sinner during the ongoing run and Carlos Alcaraz in Madrid.

Rublev is chasing his third title in the category and 17th overall. He faces Australia’s Alexei Popyrin in Monday’s title clash. The pair have faced twice before, with Popyrin winning their most recent encounter at Monte-Carlo, where Rublev was the defending champion.