Tennis has a problem: Jannik Sinner has made the sport a one-horse race

Jannik Sinner has emulated the ancient Visigoths by capturing Rome – or at least its tennis event – with a display of overwhelming might and superiority.

At a time when Sinner’s only genuine threat, Carlos Alcaraz, has been ruled out by a worrying wrist injury, this dominant display added to the recent impression that men’s tennis has become a one-horse race.

When Sinner defeated Andrey Rublev in Friday’s quarter-final, he became the first man ever to win 32 matches in a row at Masters 1000 level. Sunday’s 6-4, 6-4 win over Casper Ruud in the Rome final extended that number to 34, including a remarkable six straight titles.

Appropriately, it was a Sinner forehand winner that sealed the win in 105 minutes in front of a jubilant, chanting crowd. It was the first time Sinner had won the biggest tournament to be hosted in his native Italy, and it made him only the second man to claim all nine Masters events – a feat known as the “Golden Masters” – after Novak Djokovic.

“This year was the 50th year since an Italian won [this title],” Sinner said after his victory. “I’m really happy. There was a lot of tension on both sides, but I tried to put myself in the best position.”

Sinner always did seem to be in the ideal position on the court, and even when his laser-like groundstrokes failed to get the job done, he could always fall back on the latest club in his golf bag: the drop shot, which he has perfected over the eight months since telling reporters at the US Open that “I’m trying to be a bit more unpredictable as a player”.

Had Sinner not succumbed unexpectedly to Djokovic in the semi-finals of January’s Australian Open, we might be looking at a man who had collected every one of 2026’s significant titles. As it is, he is now going into the French Open with a frightening record of 36 wins from 38 outings this season.

When you bear in mind that the most mathematically supreme season ever recorded on the ATP Tour was John McEnroe’s 1984: 82 wins from 85 matches, or 96.5 per cent – you can see that Sinner’s 94.7 per cent is in a similar ballpark.

Sinner has created a situation in which he is priced as a better-than-odds-on favourite for the upcoming French Open. If you put a tenner on him today, most bookmakers would offer a payout of only £4 in return.

Sinner may be determined to avoid predictability in his strokeplay, but he is overseeing the most predictable clay-court swing since 2010, when Rafael Nadal became the last man to go unbeaten through the red dirt.

To add to the problems for Sinner’s opponents, he is winning almost every match in straight sets, so his energy levels remain high. After the previous Masters 1000 event in Madrid, he said that he had arrived feeling a little weary but still managed to recover during the tournament.

Can anyone step up and challenge him in Paris? It is unlikely. France’s Arthur Fils and Spain’s Rafael Jodar are two young players who have generated recent buzz, but Sinner handled them both comfortably when he faced them in consecutive matches in Madrid.

Having held two match points in last year’s final, before Alcaraz pulled off an otherworldly comeback, Sinner will be extremely motivated to land his fifth major title and thus complete the career grand slam.

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