Marin Čilić

Marin Čilić ( born 28 September 1988) is a Croatian professional tennis player.

When the first tennis courts in the town were built in 1991, Marin and his friends were among the first to play on them.

At the recommendation of Goran Ivanišević, in 2004, at the age of 15, Čilić moved to San Remo, Italy to work with Ivanišević's former coach, Bob Brett.

He has a younger brother, Mile, who also plays tennis.

Čilić began playing on the junior ITF circuit in spring 2004.

At the start he played on clay courts, winning the La Vie Junior Cup Villach in singles and the Dutch Junior Open in doubles.

He then qualified for the 2004 US Open, where he lost in the second round to Sam Querrey.

In 2004, Čilić played one Futures event (Croatia F1), at which he reached the second round; he finished the year tied at No. 1463 on the rankings of the ATP Tour.

In 2005, he won the French Open title in Boys' singles, beating Andy Murray in the semifinal and Antal van der Duim in the final.

He finished 2005 ranked number two behind American Donald Young.

While on the junior circuit, he won six tournaments in singles and four in doubles with his Canadian partner, Greg Kates.

Before representing Croatia, he played for Bosnia and Herzegovina as a junior with partner Zachary Rosen.

He played seven Futures tournaments in 2005, winning one, the Croatia F3 event; two Challenger tournaments, in Zagreb and Geneva; and one ATP International Series tournament, the Croatia Open, where he lost in the opening round.

He finished the year ranked No. 587.

In 2006, he played three Futures, winning the Croatia F1 and Croatia F2 events.

He also played in nine Challengers, nine International Series events (reaching the semifinals at Gstaad), and two Davis Cup ties, against Austria and Argentina.

By the end of the year, he was ranked No. 170.

In 2007, he won the first and second professional tournaments of his career: the Casablanca Challenger (in April) and the Rijeka Challenger (in May).

In June, at the Queen's Club Championships, he beat Tim Henman in the first round after trailing 2–4 in the final set, and reached the quarterfinals, where he fell to Andy Roddick.

After that performance, he reached a new career-high ranking of No. 101 on 18 June 2007.

In the World Group playoffs in the first round of the 2007 Davis Cup, Čilić beat Benjamin Becker of Germany; however, Croatia went on to lose the tie, three matches to two.

In 2008, Čilić reached the semifinals at the Chennai Open, in both singles and doubles.

In the singles, he was defeated by Mikhail Youzhny, who went on to win the tournament.

Čilić made it to the fourth round of the 2008 Australian Open, taking out two seeds on his way, including 2007 Australian Open finalist Fernando González.

James Blake beat him in the fourth round.

He had achieved his goal for the year of reaching the top 40.

His fourth-round result at the Australian Open put him at no. 39 in the ATP rankings.

At the 2008 Olympics, he reached the second round of the men's singles, beating Juan Mónaco before losing to Fernando González.

Čilić has won 20 ATP Tour singles titles, including a major at the 2014 US Open.

Čilić also made it to the fourth round of Wimbledon, beating Jarkko Nieminen in five sets in the second round and knocking-out 14th seed Paul-Henri Mathieu.

He was also runner-up at the 2017 Wimbledon Championships and the 2018 Australian Open, and won a silver medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in the men's doubles tournament partnering Ivan Dodig.

His career-high singles ranking is world No. 3, achieved on 28 January 2018.

Čilić has reached the semifinal stage or better at all four majors, and the quarterfinal stage or better at all nine ATP Masters 1000 tournaments.

He is one of six active players with at least 20 ATP Tour titles and one of the five active players to reach at least the semifinal stage at all four majors.

Alongside compatriot Goran Ivanišević, Čilić is widely considered to be one of the greatest Croatian tennis players in history.

Marin Čilić was born in Medjugorje, SR Bosnia and Herzegovina, a town in the Herzegovina region of Bosnia and Herzegovina to Bosnian Croat parents.

He was raised as a Catholic.

His father Zdenko Čilić was determined that his sons – Marin and older brothers Vinko and Goran – would have the opportunities he lacked in playing sports.

On 28 April 2018, he married his long time girlfriend Kristina Milković.

They have two sons together, Baldo and Vito.