Dimitri Poliakov (born 19 January 1968) is a former professional

tennis Tennis is a List of racket sports, racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent (singles (tennis), singles) or between two teams of two players each (doubles (tennis), doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket st ...

player from

Ukraine Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...

Career

Poliakov, a clay court specialist and the Soviet singles champion in 1990, had his breakthrough year in 1991, when he won the Yugoslavia Open, an

ATP Tour The ATP Tour (known as ATP World Tour between January 2009 and December 2018) is the sole worldwide top-tier tennis tour for men organized by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) founded in 1990 that replaced the earlier dual Grand Prix ...

event. This saw him break into the top 100 for the first time. He was also runner-up in the Austrian Open, with partner

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. These would be the only two

finals that he reached during his career. In 1993 he made it into the semi-finals of the

Kremlin Cup The Kremlin Cup () is a professional tennis tournament played on indoor hard courts, which was suspended in 2022. It was part of the ATP Tour 250 series of the ATP Tour and was a Premier Tournament on the WTA Tour. It was held annually at the ...

, as qualifier. He defeated number three seed

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in the opening round and then best

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6–0, 6–3 and

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of the

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. His tournament ended when he was defeated by

Marc Rosset Marc Rosset (; born 7 November 1970) is a Swiss former professional tennis player. He is best known for winning the men's singles gold medal at the 1992 Summer Olympics. He also won a major doubles title, at the French Open in 1992 partnering c ...

in three sets. He had one of the best wins of his career in 1992 when he defeated world number 12 Carlos Costa in Vienna in straight sets. From 1993 to 1998, Poliakov was a regular fixture in the Ukraine Davis Cup team. He had a 10–2 record in singles. His doubles record was 9–5 and seven of those wins came with Andrei Medvedev, which is a national record. He had also played in two

Davis Cup The Davis Cup is the premier international team event in men's tennis. It is organised by the International Tennis Federation (ITF) and contested annually between teams from over 150 competing countries, making it the world's largest annual ...

campaigns for the Soviet Union team in 1990 and 1991. He reached the second round of a

Grand Slam Grand Slam or Grand slam may refer to: Games and sports * Grand slam, winning category terminology originating in contract bridge and other whist card games Athletics * Grand Slam Track, professional track and field league Auto racing * ...

singles draw on three occasions, twice as a qualifier. In the men's doubles he appeared in three Grand Slam tournaments but never progressed part the first round.ITF Tennis Profile
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ATP career finals

Singles: 1 (1–0)

Doubles: 1 (0–1)

Challenger titles

Singles: (4)

Doubles: (5)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Poliakov, Dimitri 1968 births Living people Ukrainian male tennis players Soviet male tennis players National University of Kharkiv alumni Tennis players from Kyiv 20th-century Ukrainian sportsmen