Jannik Sinner lifts the trophy. © ANSA / ALESSANDRO DI MARCO
He is the king of the tennis world – and impressively underlined that in Turin. Jannik Sinner won the ATP Finals in an outstanding manner on Sunday and crowned his dream year.
17. November 2024
By: thomas debelyak
How often have he run out of superlatives, how often have fans struggled to find words for what he achieves. But for this Jannik Sinner there are apparently no limits. The Sesto superstar crowned his absolute dream year of 2024 on Sunday and won the title at the ATP Finals in Turin. Thanks to another gala performance, Sinner prevailed in the final against Taylor Fritz (ATP 5) 6:4, 6:4. This makes the South Tyrolean the first player from Italy to win this glorious tournament.
The statistics alone at the ATP Finals, the tournament for the eight best tennis players of the year, show that Sinner is currently playing like someone from another planet. In five games he didn’t give up a single set (no one has done that in the finals for 38 years), and he didn’t even have to go into a tie break. And South Tyrol’s golden boy was never on the field for longer than 101 minutes. On Sunday, he hit his opponent Taylor Fritz – after all, US Open finalist and Alexander Zverev defeater – with the balls so hard that the American kept looking helpless (or desperate) towards his box. The fans in Turin, however, couldn’t stop celebrating.
What Sinner has achieved in the last eleven months is simply outstanding. The Sexten native won his first two Grand Slam titles – one in Melbourne, one in New York – and rose to number 1 in the world. He has been sitting on the great tennis throne since June – and if he continues to play like this, he will probably stay there for a long time.
Fritz is at a loss
“You don’t see on TV how fast Sinner’s punches are,” said Casper Ruud on Saturday after the semi-final defeat against the Pusterer. And this is exactly what Taylor Fritz came to on Sunday. Sinner’s first service in particular was from another world. With such hammer-hard serves, the return becomes a Herculean task for every opponent.
Taylor Fritz had no chance. © APA/afp / MARCO BERTORELLO
When Sinner then takes the serve from his opponent, it is clear that the match will not last long. In the first set, Sinner got the break in the seventh game to make it 4:3 and pulled away, in the second section he made things clear after just five games and took the serve from poor Taylor Fritz. After 1.25 hours, Sinner earned the first match point, converted it – and caused a frenetic party in the stands.
The tennis year is not yet over for Jannik Sinner. Next week he will play with Italy in the Davis Cup finals in Malaga. Last year he led the Azzurri to the title.
