The Italian tennis player Jannik Sinner, number 1 in the world ranking, defeated the American Taylor Fritz (5) in the final in Turin and celebrated winning his first ATP Finals title.
Sinner, 23, defeated Fritz (27) with a double 6-4 after 1 hour and 25 minutes of play at the Inalpi Arena to celebrate his 70th victory of the season (he only lost 6 games) and his eighth title of the year.
“It’s a special moment, but it means a lot to win in front of this incredible audience. I tried to look for a better key than last year, today there was more tension. I’m happy to share this with the Italian public,” said Sinner, who scored 14 points with his service, six more than Fritz.
The “azzurro” tennis player, who during the year registered a record of 21.4 million euros in earnings, was champion this year of the Australian Open and the US Open (he is the first Italian to win two Grand Slams on different surfaces) in addition having conquered the Masters 1000 in Miami, Cincinnati and Shanghai and the ATP 500 in Rotterdam and Halle.
“There is no more beautiful place to finish the season, which was incredible. But the work does not stop. The crowd was incredible: normally the applause starts from the first game, but I arrived here a week early and we hope to see each other again next year “added Sinner.
The Italian, who had lost the final of the ATP Finals 2023 with the Serbian Novak Djokovic (6), also celebrated the conquest of the eighteenth title of his career and is the third player in the Open Era to have won the Australian Open, the US Open and the ATP Finals after “Nole” and the Swiss Roger Federer.
“I am very, very happy for what I showed this week and throughout the year and I am very happy to finish the season here in this way, playing very good tennis. I managed to start very well in this competition and I finished better than I started” , Sinner later analyzed at a press conference.
“I am a person who works a lot, I try to understand what I am doing wrong and then work on it. When you combine talent and work you become a good player, but a player who is just talent without work probably loses to someone who has both “warned the Italian.
But Sinner once again highlighted that this season is the result of the work he did with his team, which includes the Australian Darren Cahill and Simone Vagnozzi, who were joined by Marco Panichi (physical trainer) and Ulises Badio (physiotherapist), replacements for Umberto Ferrara and Giacomo Naldi.
“I didn’t face everything alone, I had my team behind me, I had days when I didn’t feel well, many times I didn’t sleep well at night, and in these cases a combination is needed between the player who goes to the field, and When I come in I don’t think about what’s outside the field, but the team is also necessary, which is very strong,” explained Sinner.
“I was lucky to have Simone, Darren, to have people around me who helped me be stable and thanks to this we continue working every day and we are also improved here,” Sinner completed when responding to his Clostebol doping.
It was precisely because of that doping, detected at the Masters 1000 in Indian Wells and for which Sinner was acquitted by the International Tennis Integrity Agency (ITIA) for the Clostebol positive (although the World Anti-Doping Agency filed an appeal before the Court of Arbitration for Sport ) that Panichi and Badio replaced Ferrara and Naldi, indicated as those responsible for the positive.
Later, he spoke with the Italian TV program “Che tempo che fa” and denied having reached the top of his level at just 23 years old.
“I’m pretty sure that at 23 you can’t be at 100%, there are areas to improve, it’s normal, at 23 nobody is perfect. I have my team around me that pushes me a lot and I can’t wait to start work again and try to do better. This will make me an even better player because if you want to maintain this position you have to always improve, the work never stops,” Sinner emphasized.
“Congratulations to Jannik, he had a great match and a great tournament. He plays amazing tennis. It’s fantastic to end the year at the ATP Final, thanks to the fans. I felt really loved throughout the week even though I played twice against Jannik. It was an incredible crowd,” Fritz highlighted.
During the award ceremony, the Italian Andrea Gaudenzi, president of the ATP, announced in the presence of Angelo Binaghi, head of the Italian Tennis and Paddle Federation (FITP), that the ATP Finals will continue to be held in the country between 2026 and 2030.
“The news that we will be here for another 5 years makes me very happy. Thank you Andrea (Gaudenzi) and Angelo (Binaghi) for this great work last year the emotion was a little different,” celebrated Sinner.
“Today two important matches were played: the one that saw our Jannik Sinner triumph over the American Taylor Fritz and the one that, off the field, deals with the future of the ATP Finals. A future that will allow them to remain in Italy and this, naturally, It makes us very happy. As we had the opportunity to reiterate, as institutions, together with the Piemonte region, we will do everything possible to make these five years in Turin,” guaranteed the city’s mayor, Stefano Lo Russo.
“In the meantime, let us celebrate Jannik Sinner, who this week was an extraordinary testimony of Italian and Turin sport in the world. Tomorrow I will propose to the City Council that it grant him honorary citizenship of Turin, in honor of the important bond he has forged with our city “, anticipated Lo Russo.
For his part, Binaghi thanked the ATP for renewing “its trust in us and our president Gaudenzi with whom we will make this event even bigger.”
“We will have the ATP Finals until 2030, I have no words. We are a great country and it is also thanks to your passion,” Binaghi concluded in reference to the support of the public throughout the tournament.
Also the president of the Piemonte region, Alberto Cirio, acknowledged his joy: “today we celebrate Jannik Sinner, who gives us incredible emotions and a wonderful victory and takes Italy to the world podium, and the certainty that the ATP Finals will remain in the country until 2030”.
“I am very satisfied with this result and I believe that if Italy once again managed to host the ATP Finals, this is also thanks to the organizational and hosting capacity that the Piedmont region and the city of Turin have been able to demonstrate in recent years” Cirio remarked.
“Now we continue the work to obtain the presence of the ATP Finals here for the next 5 years, Turin deserves it, Piemonte deserves it and the thousands of enthusiasts who have contributed in recent years to making the event grow and making it unique deserve it, as confirmed by the public and athletes,” Cirio concluded.
Turin will compete for the venue with Milan, which has the Santa Giulia stadium, currently under construction for the Winter Olympic Games that the city will organize with Cortina D’Ampezzo in 2026.
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