New ATP rankings were released on Monday February 1st and Marin Cilic is now a top ten player.
Marin Cilic moved up 4 spots in the ATP rankings on Monday and that was good enough to put him into the top 10 on tour, just 100 ranking points up on Fernando Gonzalez.
Cilic received 720 tour ranking points for making the semifinals of the Australian Open and his future for Masters Series and Grand Slam success looks very bright, as he is the youngest player currently in the men's top 10 (however he is only 5 days younger than 5th ranked Juan Martin Del Potro).
Cilic could easily be a top 8 player when the summer hard court season comes around because his level of play is high and his results from the early months of 2009 were not distinguished. He has a lot of room for improvement with so few points dropping out of his total this year and with the potential for so many to be added on.
Consider the following lackluster results that were achieved by Cilic in 2009 for the following ATP World Tour Masters 1000 events, tournaments that took place between the Aussie and the French:
Indian Wells, Round of 32, 45 points.
Miami, Round of 32, 45 points.
Rome, Round of 16, 90 points.
Madrid, Round of 32, 45 points.
This year, in these events, Cilic will be ranked higher than he was last year and his level of play is much higher as well. It is by no means a stretcher to suggest that Cilic might earn more tour ranking points in one of these tournaments this year than what he achieved in all four combined last year.
Cilic is a player to watch and he could be a top 5 seed heading into the US Open later in 2010 although that would likely require strong showings at the French and Wimbledon, besides consistent high level play at the Masters Series level.
You should be sprinkling his odds right now for Flushing Meadows as they are quite long at +2000 (20/1) with Sky Bet and the hard court appears to be his best surface.
Go to Sky Bet to bet on tennis futures.