Dominic Thiem picks his top five one-handed backhands in tennis history

Dominic Thiem is still the most recent player with a one-handed backhand to win a Grand Slam title.

After falling short in three previous finals, Thiem finally broke through at the 2020 US Open, beating Alexander Zverev to claim his first major title.

Since then, Stefanos Tsitsipas has come closest among one-handers, reaching the French Open final in 2021 and the Australian Open final in 2023.

Thiem also collected a total of 17 tour-level titles during his career, adding further weight to his achievements on tour.

But despite how effective the shot was for him throughout his career, the retired Austrian doesn’t believe his one-handed backhand belongs among the top five in tennis history.

Dominic Thiem leaves himself out of all-time best one-handed backhands

Speaking on the ‘More Than A Name‘ podcast, Thiem was asked to pick his top-five one-handed backhands ever.

“For me, Stan [Wawrinka] is number one, Richard Gasquet number two, Roger [Federer] number three, Gaston Gaudio number four – unbelievable one-handed backhand,” he said.

When pressed to include himself in the list, Thiem replied: “I’m not going to put myself in this; that’s not right. I’ll go with [Lorenzo] Musetti.”

Many players have said publicly that they consider Stan Wawrinka’s backhand superior even to Federer’s.

The 40-year-old Swiss is set to call time on his career at the end of this season. Wawrinka won three Grand Slam titles during an era dominated by Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.

Over his impressive career, Wawrinka has picked up 16 ATP titles and climbed as high as world No.3 in the rankings.

Rafael Nadal explains how he exploited Roger Federer’s backhand

Plenty of people might pick Federer as the owner of the best one-handed backhand, though that reputation was based more on style than substance early in his career.

Nadal used to aim for it regularly, and it wasn’t until 2017 that Federer began playing more aggressively with the shot, helping him find a second wind later in his career.

Nadal said: “That’s one thing he got wrong in his career: he let me repeat shots on his backhand.”

“His answer was a sliced backhand, and I have a very good shot when it’s sliced. It doesn’t bother me, I like to return it, and I return it hard, I’m not uncomfortable.”

The turning point came when Federer switched to a larger racquet head. After making the change, his record against Nadal improved significantly.

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