Arthur Fils will make his ATP Finals debut over the coming week, having made a triumphant return from a career-threatening injury. The Frenchman ended his 2025 season early after picking up a stress fracture in his back, and did not play a match again until February.
He continued to face setbacks this year, most notably missing the French Open, but also retiring from tournaments in Rome and Basel. But Fils also enjoyed a career-best season. He won the two biggest titles of his career, a Masters 1000 in Cincinnati and an ATP 500 in Barcelona, and he broke into the world's top 10 for the first time.
One Grand Slam win in 2026
Fils has racked up 3,625 ranking points so far in 2026, enough to qualify for the season-ending championships for the very first time. But incredibly, only 60 of those ranking points came at Grand Slam level, as he won just one match across the four Majors this year.
Part of that is down to injuries. Fils missed the Australian Open during his back injury layoff, and then had to pull out of the French Open on the eve of the tournament with a hip injury – the same injury that forced him to retire from the Italian Open weeks earlier.
When he did finally return to the Majors, Fils had some brutal draws. He beat Raphael Collignon 7-5 6-1 6-3 in the first round of Wimbledon, but it was his only win at the Slams in 2026.
Difficult draws at the Majors
In round two, Fils came up against 2021 Wimbledon runner-up Matteo Berrettini, a former world No. 6 who dropped down the rankings due to injury problems of his own. Berrettini won in four sets.
And it was a similar story at the US Open. Seeded 10th, Fils received another tough draw, coming up against former world No. 3 Stefanos Tsitsipas, a two-time Grand Slam finalist who also slipped down the rankings. Although he'd just been crowned the Cincinnati Open champion, the Frenchman lost his opening match in New York.
Fils has more than made up for those losses with his results on the ATP Tour this year. When he returned to action at the ATP 250 event in Montpellier in February, he immediately reached the quarter-finals. Weeks later, he finished runner-up to Carlos Alcaraz at the Qatar Open.
ATP Finals prize money and draw
As well as his title wins in Barcelona and Cincinnati, Fils reached two Masters semi-finals in Miami and Madrid, and two Masters quarter-finals in Indian Wells and Montreal. The 22-year-old has a 39-16 record so far in 2026, and can improve that at the upcoming ATP Finals.
Fils is the No. 6 seed at the year-end championships and has been drawn in the John McEnroe Group, meaning he will face Alexander Zverev, Ben Shelton, and Rafael Jodar in the round-robin stage. There are up to 1,500 ranking points up for grabs in Turin, plus a maximum winners' cheque of £3,884,326 ($5,171,000) for an undefeated champion.
Players contest three round-robin group matches, and the two group winners advance to the knockout semi-finals. This means that some can still reach the semis and final, or even go on to lift the trophy, having lost at least one match in the group stage. Each round-robin win is worth £304,226 ($405,000). A semi-final win comes with a prize cheque of £905,917 ($1,206,000), and winning the championship match earns a player £1,811,834 ($2,412,000).
The ATP Finals prize money has increased for 2026. Last year, Jannik Sinner banked £3,812,808 ($5,071,000) for going undefeated across all five of his matches as he successfully defended his title in Turin. But the world No. 2 was forced to shut down his 2026 season early with a knee injury and has not played a match since July, so he cannot make it a hat-trick of titles at the ATP Finals.
For Fils, qualifying for the season-ending event is already a huge milestone. The world No. 7 recently shared a note he wrote on his phone while injured in September 2025. It read: "2026 I will be top 10 and I will play Turin." And he's ticked off both goals.
