How Muller Has Overcome Crohn's Disease To Face Djokovic At US Open
When Novak Djokovic fulfilled his US Open media responsibilities on Friday, one of his stops was with the tournament’s social media team, which asked him to share a few words about his first-round opponent, Alexandre Muller.
“He's good looking,” Djokovic said, cracking a laugh. “But that's not enough.”
“I think it's true,” Muller quipped to ATPTour.com the next day. “I think he doesn't know me. But maybe he saw some pictures and he thought I was beautiful.”
Muller is far more than that, though. The 26-year-old is enjoying the best season of his career and serving as an inspiration to plenty of people of all ages throughout the world. At the age of 14, the Frenchman was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease, a chronic inflammatory bowel disease.
“I was just a little bit sick. I went to the doctor, and he gave me some medicine,” Muller recalled. “I was quite young — 14 years old is young — so I kept it to myself for one year. But it was like an inflammation. So after one year, the inflammation was so big and I couldn't move anymore. I lost maybe 10 kilos.
“When I came back to my parents for the weekend, during the night, they heard the toilet like 50 times. So they said, ‘Okay, there is something wrong.’ So I went to the hospital, I did all the exams and everything and they said okay, it's Crohn's disease.”
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It was a devastating blow for someone who was entering a key moment in his tennis journey. Muller began playing tennis at the age of six, when his family moved to Meyrargues, a small village in France. There was an old hard court at the home they moved to and Muller’s father, Stefan, refurbished it. Nobody in the family had a history in the sport, but Stefan and Alexandre would play at home.
“At the beginning, I was crying because I was losing with my dad,” Muller said. “But after one or two years he was crying.”
Too good for his father, Muller began playing at a local club and quickly showed potential. Having also played football from a young age, he was told it was necessary to focus on tennis in order to train more. The Frenchman moved to a bigger club in Aix en Provence.
But by his early teens, Crohn’s disease was taking its toll on the Frenchman. His future in tennis seemed in doubt.
“It was not easy because the doctor told me if I wanted to be in good shape, I needed to stop tennis and sports in general. Not [playing] the sport, but when you're a professional tennis player, you practise every day, so it's very hard. I needed to stop it,” Muller said. “I stopped training for maybe two months, I took a lot of cortisone. It's the process with this disease. So now I'm trying to manage it.
“I need to do an injection to myself every two weeks, all my life. So it's not that easy, but I'm trying to manage it.”
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Muller explained that it is still “not so easy” even though he is a world-class athlete. “Sometimes I’m feeling quite bad,” he said.
But in 2023, Muller has proven he belongs at the upper levels of the ATP Tour. He began the season at No. 160 in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings and has consistently risen, climbing as high as No. 76 last month.
Muller reached the quarter-finals in Doha, where he upset Botic van de Zandschulp and pushed former World No. 1 Andy Murray to three sets. In Marrakech, he upset Richard Gasquet and Lorenzo Musetti en route to his first ATP Tour final and his first step into the world’s Top 100.
“I thought before it was very important for me. But at the moment when I won the matches, it was in Marrakech the semi-final. I was looking at the live rankings and said, ‘Okay, now I'm Top 100,’” Muller said. “But you always want more. When I was 400, I wanted to be in qualies in the Grand Slams. I was qualies in the Grand Slams and then I wanted to be in the main draw. I'm main draw, so now I want to be Top 50.
“You always want more, so I was happy for sure. But I hope it's not the end of my story in tennis.”
The 2023 season has been a dream-like chapter in his tennis story. At Roland Garros, Muller played Jannik Sinner on Court Philippe-Chatrier. A month later, he faced eventual champion Carlos Alcaraz on Centre Court at Wimbledon. On Monday evening, Muller will try to stun 23-time major winner Novak Djokovic in the first round of the US Open inside Arthur Ashe Stadium.
“I think the most important thing is that I need to enjoy the moment, because I don't know what's going to be my career,” Muller said. “But I'm going to play on centre court, night session, Arthur Ashe. I need to enjoy it, play my tennis, we'll see what happens.”
Muller has seen Djokovic around at tournaments, but has never spoken to him or trained with the Serbian. But the 26-year-old is very familiar with the three-time US Open champion’s game.
“I think if he doesn't want to miss the ball, he cannot miss. That's the thing. But yeah, he's the man who got the most titles at ATP [Masters] 1000s, Grand Slams,” Muller said. “For the moment he is the biggest player in tennis history if you watch the career. Everybody knows the game of Djokovic. He's very solid, returns amazing. Moving amazing. So a lot of amazing things. Difficult to say something bad about his game. But I will try my best.”
Just more than a decade ago, a doctor told Muller he needed to stop playing serious tennis. This year he is playing on some of the biggest stages in international sport against the best players on the ATP Tour.
On Saturday morning, he walked onto the court inside Arthur Ashe Stadium for the first time for a practice session with countryman Arthur Fils. Soon when he makes the same walk for his match, 23,000 screaming fans will be watching.
“Life is crazy sometimes. I think it's very important because I received some messages from [some people] because in France a lot of people know that I have Crohn's disease and on this planet, on earth, there are a lot of people with this disease,” Muller said. “If I have something to tell everybody... trust yourself, and you can do some beautiful things, even with diseases or something like this. Just try to manage this and you will see beautiful things happen.”