TURIN, Italy – It’s what you’ve been waiting for.
Some really good tennis players have gathered in northern Italy for the ATP Tour Finals, the sport’s most exclusive men’s tournament. Only the eight best available players will receive invitations.
Novak Djokovic, the best player of his time and perhaps of all time, is not here. He is 37 years old, injured and tired, trying to save himself for next year’s Grand Slam tournaments.
For the generation of players born in the mid-to-late 1990s, Djokovic’s absence represents a void they have been dreaming of for most of their careers. For the first time since 2001, no member of the Big Three (Djokovic, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal) will participate in the event.
It is a warning that will extend to the rest of the calendar for a long time, removing the top layer of the sandwich that for years squeezed out all those hot shots born in the years prior to the 21st century of Grand Slams and Masters 1,000. When Djokovic won the US Open in 2023, he won his 66th title in 79 tournaments. They faced each other so frequently in finals and semi-finals that players born in the 1990s barely had a chance of losing in the latter stages, let alone winning.
“I think the mental battle I had, well, every time I was in the quarters, I was playing against Djokovic,” Taylor Fritz, 27, said of this year’s tournament. There, Fritz won his first Grand Slam semi-final and then his first final. He lost to Yannick Sinner, who, along with Carlos Alcaraz, is the avatar that Djokovic and Nadal (who retires this month after the Davis Cup) have maintained long enough to wreak havoc on the tennis lives of the sandwich generation.
Just when they thought the Big Three would lose all their oxygen, a 19-year-old from Murcia and a 21-year-old from the Dolomites entered Arthur Ashe Stadium in 2022 and played five sets of computer tennis. He once again suffocated the group of 90. Since that quarterfinal, Alcaraz and Sinner have won six times between them, and both have spent time as the world No. 1, which Sinner currently holds.
Yannick Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz are used to receiving gifts (Lintao Zhang/Getty Images)
Djokovic won on other courts. The sandwich was squeezed again.
“I guess those guys are younger, but they’ve done better than the ’90s kids, whatever you or I want to call them,” Casper Rudy, 25, a three-time Grand Finalist, said in a news release. Slam. conference on Monday. Ruud lost to Alcaraz in the final of that fateful 2022 US Open; Nadal and Djokovic destroyed it at Roland Garros in consecutive years.
“This year they were almost in a league of their own.”
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Sports aren’t usually like that. Between the Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi reign of the 1990s and the rise of Federer and then Nadal and Djokovic there was an interreign. There was time for Patrick Rafters, Marat Safins, Carlos Moyas and Juan Carlos Ferreros to get some attention. Later, Andy Murray and Stan Wawrinka fought at a high level; Juan Martín del Potro and Marin Cilic missed opportunities when they arrived.
There’s unlikely to be an interstate for some time yet, but there are glimmers of that light. Ruud earned his first victory over Alcaraz in five tries on Monday afternoon, playing against a seasoned opponent in his worst environment: indoors on a fast court. He then admitted that Alcaraz’s error play greatly contributed to his success as he attempts to play more aggressively to reach the heights that Sinner and Alcaraz have reached.
“That’s not the nature of my game,” he said. “I hesitate a little bit when I need to be too aggressive. But I will try.”
“Try one more time. Fail again. “It is better to fail,” wrote Samuel Beckett. This is about what tennis has become for Rudd’s generation, which also includes Fritz, Alexander Zverev, Daniil Medvedev and Andrei Rublev, all of whom were in Turin.
Andrei Rublev is among a group of players trying to emerge from the shadow of the Big Three (Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images)
Some manage the process better than others.
Medvedev, the most successful member of the group, finds himself in the midst of a bitter struggle for motivation. Tired mentally and physically, he reached the end of the lines.
“Every practice is a fight, every match is a fight,” the six-time Grand Slam finalist and 2021 US Open champion said in a news conference on Sunday after losing to Fritz in straight sets. Recently, Medvedev has even outlasted the Sinner, winning six matches in a row with his impressive defense and serving. Since then, Sinner’s shoulder issues, throwing changes and development have set him back. Alcaraz’s ability to dominate the front of the court contradicted the deep return strategy used by Medvedev, which would outshine so many opponents.
Medvedev, 28, is the former world number 1. Zverev, 27, is currently the world No. 2 and has won two ATP Finals, but says he knows he only holds that position on the ATP computer.
Being at the peak of their sport can make them feel like losers. Tennis does that to you.
Zverev faced off against another prominent member of the sandwich generation on Monday night in Rublev, who is 28 years old and always on the brink of another self-inflicted mishap. He has been bloodied several times over the past year. As if to rub salt in the wounds, the match was delayed about 20 minutes, while the ATP Cup gave Sinner the year as world number 1.
Maybe it wasn’t a good time for the ceremony. The Tour Finals are basically a sandwich-making convention. It will be awkward anyway.
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Like Ruud, as well as Frith, 27, Zverev has accepted the challenge of trying to match Alcaraz and Sinner, if not every week or every season, but at least during the seven-match fortnight, when he can win a so far elusive Grand Slam. He is an Olympic gold medalist, but has said that all the other events he has won will ultimately mean nothing if he doesn’t win one of the four events.
To that end, Zverev basically gave up any results he might have achieved in the fall. Last month in Paris, he practiced for an hour every day after his matches while winning the last major tournament of the year, the Paris Masters.
He said he was satisfied with the result. I would rather win than lose. Who wouldn’t? But he’s still focused on getting better, and if that means taking his tired legs to court in Paris, so be it. The Australian Open was just over two months ago and is just around the corner; Zverev wants to play the type of tennis that the sport demands.
Alexander Zverev is in search of a grand slam (Marco Bertorello/AFP via Getty Images)
Like Ruud, he believes he needs to play more aggressively to have a chance of staying on the field with Sinner and Alcaraz.
“When they get an easy ball, when they’re on the offensive end, 90 percent of the time, it’s either a winner or an unforced error,” he said. “The harder they hit the ball, the more aggressive they are. I think I can improve in this aspect. That’s what I’m trying to do.”
After Sinner’s performance, he did very well against Rublev on Monday night in a 6-4, 6-4 victory, pushing the court and swinging his racquet almost every time he had a chance to score a point. even sometimes when there was no opportunity.
None of this is to say that all hope is lost and that Sinner and Alcaraz will win everything that matters for a decade. It just doesn’t happen. As Rudd noted on Monday after his victory: “They are human too. I mean, they will miss games, not just for a year.”
The offender is still restricted by off-field forces that are greater than those of any player. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) called for a suspension of one or two years in its appeal against Sinner’s doping case, which it brought to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in September.
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Earlier this year, Sinner tested positive twice for clostebol, an anabolic steroid. Three tribunals convened by tennis anti-doping authorities accepted his explanation that the substance accidentally entered his system after his physiotherapist used it to treat a cut on his finger and then massaged Sinner. WADA also accepts his explanation, but believes he must take responsibility for his team’s actions.
Until then, players will have to try to figure out how to beat him and Alcaraz on the tennis court. It’s Fritz’s turn on Tuesday, as he and Sinner will meet in a rematch of the US Open final, which Sinner won by doing what Fritz does, but a little better, and changing his return position when Fritz won some speed. Since he was in his twenties, Fritz hasn’t been in the top 10 like his European peers. He has recently become a serious threat with a ticking clock and is trying to maximize his potential before it is too late.
(Top photo: Nicolo Campo/LightRocket via Getty Images)
