Former American ace comments on Jannik Sinner's strange choice

11/21/2024 05:30 PM

Jannik Sinner could not have played better in 2024. The Italian ace has been impressive for almost the entire season and – without that hip injury during the spring – he could have achieved an even more prestigious result at the French Open and Wimbledon Championships.

Jannik's numbers this season are truly impressive, with eight titles and more than 90% of matches won during the year. The world No. 1 has never slowed down and has reached at least the quarterfinals in all the tournaments he has played, while his opponents have struggled to keep up with his pace.

It is no coincidence that the 23-year-old from Sesto Pusteria ended the season with a huge gap over his rivals in the ATP rankings, despite Sascha Zverev winning many matches and Carlos Alcaraz winning two Major titles in 2024 (French Open and Wimbledon). Sinner's next goal is to do even better in 2025, which will be a very delicate year for his career. The Italian champion could be disqualified from the CAS at the end of the doping process and it would be a very hard blow to his image.

It is not clear when the final verdict will be issued, but the 2-time Grand Slam champion wants to stay focused on tennis as he has done in recent months. During this season, the world No. 1 won two Major titles, three Masters 1000 titles and the ATP Finals in Turin without losing a single set.

The Italian ace surprises everyone with his mental strength and his desire to improve despite successes, to fill the few gaps in his game. During some practice sessions in Monte Carlo before the Nitto ATP Finals, Jannik was seen trying out different racket models that he could use next year.

On the latest edition of the ‘Nothing Major’ podcast, former American ace Steve Johnson spoke about Sinner’s choice to try new rackets during the season: “I don’t know if you guys saw this but maybe it was before Paris, but Sinner was trying new rackets. I think he was in Monte Carlo, trying a bunch of new frames. Is that weird?”

Johnson continued: “He is number one in the world, what is there that he needs to change? I feel like that’s an odd move. Maybe he is testing something but when you are number one in the world, winning slams, money is no issue. Am I off on that or is that normal?”

Despite all the players being tired in the latter part of the season, the 2-time Grand Slam champion was unstoppable at the Nitto ATP Finals in Turin. The world number 1 did not lose a single set during his run and no opponent won more than 4 games in the same set. An impressive dominance that requires the other players to find new solutions in view of next season.

The impression is that the Italian ace still has room for improvement in some areas of the court. The 23-year-old from Sesto Pusteria has been practicing with former ATP ace Radek Stepanek lately to improve his volleys, a further testimony of his dedication to the sport. Sinner's serve has improved a lot in the last twelve months and has become a really dangerous weapon. The 2-time Grand Slam champion has suffered only two breaks in all the ATP Finals.

On the latest edition of his podcast, former World No.1 Andy Roddick opened up on Jannik’s amazing shape at the ATP Finals: "It was fun. It was weird in turn. There weren't that many close matches, right? It was, I think there was like one 3-setter, Fritz got through. But Jannik Sinner was a joke. I mean in the best possible way. He put up score lines, I wanna say it was like 4 and 3, 2 and 4, 4 and 4. He basically had to score 1 and 4 in the semis against Casper and then 4 and 4 again against Fritz in the final.”

Roddick continued: "Doing, checking his TC live and then checking his score lines, it's the score lines that you used to drop on people when you were 16 playing like in your state tournaments. And if you were a really good junior, but like, and then kind of take that out and expand it to the best on earth with no two year age groups. What he's done on hard courts this year is absurd."

Jannik will start his 2025 directly at the Australian Open, where he will try to defend the title won this year. After the Happy Slam, the Italian ace should know his fate in relation to the doping case.