Dark cloud to sunshine, Sinner signals change with US Open win

Mumbai: There’s a bit of Novak Djokovic in Jannik Sinner’s game. In his seamless court movement, in his mind-bending stretches in fetching balls, in the way he shrinks his end of the court with that you-can’t-get-past-me baseline defence and widens the other with those angles behind his groundstrokes. Italy's Jannik Sinner kisses the trophy after winning the men's final against USA's Taylor Fritz. (AFP)

There’s also a bit of Djokovic in Sinner’s mind, as this US Open showed. In his mental ability to wade through an off-court adversity that could’ve easily made him cave in on court, block the noise around it, put on the blinkers and get the job done. For the world No.1, that job was to become the US Open champion — he did that after a no sweat 6-3, 6-4, 7-5 win over American Taylor Fritz in the final — battling a storm from a doping cloud that hung over him throughout the couple of weeks.

“It was, and it’s still, a little bit in my mind,” the Italian champion said of that cloud. “It’s not that it’s gone, but when I’m on court, I try to focus on the game.”

What has gone, as it increasingly appears so, are the days of Grand Slam men’s tennis being the fiefdom of three greats who kept raking up the count well into their thirties. This year has been the domain of two players in their early twenties just about getting started in their quest for greatness.

Australian Open champion Sinner, 23, bookended his season with the US Open title. Carlos Alcaraz, 21, scripted the two winning middle chapters, at the French Open and Wimbledon. Tennis history would recall 2024 as the year of Sinner and Alcaraz, after all those years — from 2003, every season over — of Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Djokovic written all over it.

You sought a change? Change is well and truly here.

And not by accident. Sinner and Alcaraz have been individually building on to this over the last couple of years, bypassing a generation ahead of them. The odd wins against the likes of Djokovic and Nadal cropped up, routinely so pitted with the Medvedevs and Zverevs. This year, those big victories came in high stakes Slam matches, with both Sinner (Australian Open semi-final) and Alcaraz (Wimbledon final) knocking out Djokovic in going all the way.

The last time the four Slams were swept by players aged 23 and under was in 1993 (Jim Courier, Sergi Bruguera and Pete Sampras). The last time four Slams were swept by two men was in 2019. That was the backend of the Djokovic-Nadal duel. This seems to be only the beginning of a rip-roaring rivalry amid the sweeping wind of change.

“Well, it is a bit different, for sure. It’s something new, but it’s also nice to see. Nice to see new champions. Nice to see new rivalries,” Sinner said, with the US Open trophy in the foreground.

“I always have players, and I will always have players who are going to make me a better player, because there are going to be times when they beat me.”

Hasn’t happened a lot this season. Sinner’s 2024 win-loss record is now a staggering 55-5, including a tour-leading 35 victories on hard courts. His 2024 title count has swelled to six, including hard-court Masters trophies in Miami and Cincinnati and the Slam double in Melbourne and New York.

The Italian has backed up his first Slam victory with a second in the same season; something not even anyone from the Big Three can flaunt. Alcaraz’s Slam breakthrough came a couple of years ago, and one could sense it was only a matter of time for Sinner. When that time came at the Australian Open this year, overcoming a two-set deficit against Daniil Medvedev in a testing final, the feeling was mostly of “relief” for the youngster.

“Here, it was difficult because also the pre-tournament circumstances were not easy,” Sinner said. “I had a bit more pressure this time than in Australia.”

Revelations of his failed dope tests for a banned anabolic steroid, and the subsequent ban escape, were made public in the week leading into the US Open. Sinner knew what he would have to deal with off the court, and do so in a manner that wouldn’t impact him on it. Instead of evading that subject, he chose to confront it and speak up — from his first press conference in New York until his speech at the trophy ceremony where he brought it up himself.

This triumph, therefore, would have to be put in context of that troubling backdrop. It made Sinner feel unlike himself — “how I behaved or walked on the court in certain tournaments” — over the last few months.

“It was not only one week before the tournament, it was months,” he said. “Whoever knows me better, they know that something was wrong. But during this tournament, slowly I restarted to feel a little bit more how I am as a person.”

Once that began to happen, Sinner, the tennis player, wasn’t too troubled. After the first set in the first round where he was shaky, Sinner was all smooth and solid. No Fritz challenge was big enough for him in the final. No upset bug, which sent two of his biggest threats packing, could creep into him. No dark clouds lurking around could halt his progress.

“It was not easy, that’s for sure,” he said.

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