Jannik Sinner

Jannik Sinner (born 16 August 2001) is an Italian professional tennis player. He has been ranked as high as No. 36 in the world by the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP). At the 2020 French Open, he became the youngest quarterfinalist in the men's singles event since Novak Djokovic in 2006. He has won two ATP titles, and became the youngest ATP title-holder since 2008 by winning the 2020 Sofia Open.

Jannik Sinner
Country (sports) Italy
ResidenceMonte Carlo, Monaco
Born (2001-08-16) 16 August 2001[1]
Innichen, Italy
Height1.88 m (6 ft 2 in)
Turned pro2018
PlaysRight-handed (two-handed backhand)
CoachRiccardo Piatti
Andrea Volpini
Prize moneyUS$ 1,390,251
Singles
Career record35–21 (62.5%)
Career titles2
Highest rankingNo. 36 (4 January 2021)
Current rankingNo. 36 (4 January 2021)
Grand Slam Singles results
Australian Open2R (2020)
French OpenQF (2020)
WimbledonQ1 (2019)
US Open1R (2019, 2020)
Doubles
Career record2–2 (50.0%)
Career titles0
Highest rankingNo. 380 (9 March 2020)
Current rankingNo. 420 (4 January 2021)
Last updated on: 4 January 2021.

Sinner grew up in northern Italy in the German-speaking autonomous province of South Tyrol. He was active in skiing, football, and tennis as a child. After winning a national championship in skiing at age eight, Sinner switched his focus to tennis at age thirteen and moved to the Italian Riviera to train with veteran coach Riccardo Piatti. Despite limited success as a junior, Sinner began playing in professional events at age 16 and became one of the few players to win multiple ATP Challenger Tour titles by age 17. He then won the ATP Newcomer of the Year award in 2019 after breaking through into the top 100, reaching his first ATP semifinal, and winning the Next Generation ATP Finals in Milan over Alex de Minaur. Sinner continued to rise into the top 50 in 2020 with his first top 10 victories, a Grand Slam quarterfinal, and a maiden ATP title.

Sinner has an excellent two-handed backhand, and has led the ATP Tour in the amount of topspin on the shot.

Early life and background

Jannik Sinner was born 16 August 2001 to Hanspeter and Siglinde Sinner in Innichen in the German-speaking autonomous province of South Tyrol in northern Italy. He grew up in the town of Sexten on the Austrian border, where his father and mother work as a chef and a waitress at a ski lodge.[2] He has a brother named Marc.[1] Sinner began both skiing and playing tennis at age three. He was one of Italy's top junior skiers from eight to twelve years old, winning a national championship in giant slalom at age eight and earning a national runner-up at age twelve.[3][4][5] While training in skiing, Sinner gave up tennis for a year at age seven before his father pushed him to return to the sport.[6] When he resumed playing, he began working with his first regular coach Heribert Mayr.[7] Nonetheless, tennis was still only his third priority behind skiing and football.[8][9]

At age thirteen, Sinner decided to give up skiing and football in favor of tennis because he preferred to compete directly against an opponent and to have more margin of error over the course of an entire match unlike in a skiing race, and preferred to be an individual sport where he could make decisions unlike on a football team.[9] He also decided to leave his family and move to Bordighera on the Italian Riviera to train at the Piatti Tennis Centre under Riccardo Piatti and Massimo Sartori, a decision which his parents supported.[1][4][6] At the centre, Sinner lived with the family of Luka Cvjetkovic, one of his coaches.[10] Before Sinner began training in tennis full-time with Piatti, he had only been playing twice a week.[8]

Junior career

Sinner began playing on the ITF Junior Circuit in 2016. Despite having limited success as a junior, he moved mainly to the professional tour following the end of 2017. He never played the main draw of any high-level Grade 1 events in singles, and the only higher-level Grade A tournament he entered was the Trofeo Bonfiglio. He followed up an opening round loss at Italy's Grade A tournament in 2017 with a quarterfinal in 2018. That was the only junior event he played in 2018. He never played any of the junior Grand Slam tournaments. Because he entered so few high-level tournaments, Sinner's career-high junior ranking was a relatively low No. 133.[11]

Professional career

2018–19: Three Challenger titles, Next Gen champion, top 100
Sinner at the 2019 European Open in Antwerp

Sinner began playing on the ITF Men's Circuit in early 2018. With his low ranking, he could only initially be directly accepted into ITF Futures events. Nonetheless, he began receiving wild cards for ATP Challenger Tour events in the second half of the year.[12] His only ITF title of the year was in doubles,[13] and he finished the season with a ranking of No. 551.[14]

Sinner won his first ATP Challenger title in Bergamo in February 2019 at the age of 17 years and 6 months old despite entering the tournament with no match wins at the Challenger level. He became the first person born in 2001 to reach a Challenger final, and the youngest Italian to win a Challenger title in history. With the title, he rose over 200 spots in ATP rankings up to No. 324.[15][16] After his first two ITF Futures titles, Sinner entered his first ATP tournament at the Hungarian Open as a lucky loser where he notched his first tour-level win over home wild card Máté Valkusz.[17] The next week, he reached his second ATP Challenger final in Ostrava, finishing runner-up to Kamil Majchrzak.[18]

During the second half of the season, Sinner was able to play more often on the ATP Tour than the Challenger Tour.[19] He notched his first ATP Masters level victory at the Italian Open against Steve Johnson and broke into the top 200 with his next ATP win at the Croatia Open Umag in July.[14] The next month, he won a second ATP Challenger title in Lexington to become one of just eleven 17-year-olds to have won multiple Challenger titles.[20] Having lost in qualifying at Wimbledon, Sinner was able to qualify for his first Grand Slam main draw at the US Open.[21] He lost his debut match to No. 24 Stan Wawrinka.[19]

Sinner had a strong finish to the season. As a wild card at the European Open, he became the youngest player in five years to reach an ATP semifinal.[22] Along the way, he knocked off top seed and world No. 13 Gael Monfils for his first career top 50 victory.[23] This performance helped him break into the top 100 for the first time one week later.[14] At the end of the season, Sinner qualified for the 2019 Next Gen ATP Finals as the Italian wild card and the lowest seed.[24] He won his round robin group with victories over Frances Tiafoe and Mikael Ymer, only losing to Ugo Humbert. After defeating Miomir Kecmanović in the semifinals, Sinner upset top seed and world No. 18 Alex de Minaur in straight sets to win the title.[25] He played one last event in Italy the following week, winning a third Challenger title in Ortisei. Sinner finished the year at No. 78 in the world, becoming the youngest player in the year-end top 80 since Rafael Nadal in 2003.[17] He was also named ATP Newcomer of the Year.[26]

2020: French Open quarterfinal, maiden ATP title, top 40

Early in the year, Sinner made the second round at the Australian Open, recording his first Grand Slam main draw match win over home wild card Max Purcell. As a wild card at the Rotterdam Open, he earned his first top 10 victory against world No. 10 David Goffin.[27] Following the ATP Tour shutdown due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Sinner had a successful restart to the season. Although he lost his opening round match to Karen Khachanov at the US Open, he fared better back in Europe. He reached the third round at the Rome Masters, highlighted by a victory over No. 6 Stefanos Tsitsipas.[28] He then became the youngest quarterfinalist at the French Open since Novak Djokovic in 2006, and the first to make the quarterfinals on debut since Rafael Nadal in 2005. During the tournament, he defeated Goffin again as well as US Open runner-up and world No. 7 Alexander Zverev before losing to Nadal.[29][30] After a semifinal at the Cologne Championship where he lost to Zverev,[31] Sinner closed out the season by winning the Sofia Open for his first ATP title. During the event, he defeated Next Gen rival Alex de Minaur before getting a victory over Vasek Pospisil in the final.[32] He became the youngest Italian tour-level champion in the Open Era and the youngest player overall to win an ATP title since Kei Nishikori in 2008.[33][34] Sinner finished the year at No. 37 in the world.[14]

Playing style

Sinner has been compared to Roger Federer for his calm on-court demeanor and all-court movement.[3][6][10] Federer himself has praised Sinner for the balance in his game, remarking, "What I like about him is that he almost has the same speed of shooting from the forehand and backhand."[5] Sinner's groundstroke strength is his two-handed backhand, which he hits with more topspin than any other player on the ATP Tour, registering an average of 1858 revolutions per minute on the shot to go along with a fifth-best average speed of 111.2 kilometres per hour (69.1 mph).[35] Former world No. 1 junior and tennis coach Claudio Pistolesi has praised Sinner's good lateral movement, which he attributes in part to Sinner's background in skiing.[36] As such, Sinner has been compared to Novak Djokovic, who also credits a background in skiing for improving his tennis skills.[37]

Coaches

When Sinner began to prioritize tennis at age thirteen, he was coached by Riccardo Piatti, who has also been a part-time coach of Novak Djokovic and Milos Raonic.[10] At the time, he also began working with Andrea Volpini and Massimo Sartori, the latter of whom was a longtime coach of Andreas Seppi.[38] He has continued to work with Piatti as his primary coach, and Volpini as his second coach. His team also consists of physiotherapist Claudio Zimaglia and fitness coach Dalibor Sirola.[9]

Personal life

Sinner resides in Monte Carlo in Monaco.[1] He is a fan of the A.C. Milan football club.[8] One of his tennis idols is compatriot Andreas Seppi, who is also from South Tyrol. Nonetheless, he aspires to surpass Seppi in terms of achievements. For that reason, his main idols are Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic.[16]

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Sinner donated €12,500 to the Cesvi humanitarian organization to help fund medical supplies for the people in Bergamo who were facing a shortage. He also started the Sinner Pizza Challenge in which he committed to donate an additional €10 for each person who posted a photo of a pizza they made decorated with the face of Sinner himself or another Italian athlete.[8][39]

Career statistics
Main article: Jannik Sinner career statistics
Key
W  F  SF QF #R RR Q# A P Z# PO G F-S SF-B NMS NH
(W) Won; (F) finalist; (SF) semifinalist; (QF) quarterfinalist; (#R) rounds 4, 3, 2, 1; (RR) round-robin stage; (Q#) qualification round; (A) absent; (P) postponed; (Z#) Davis/Fed Cup Zonal Group (with number indication) or (PO) play-off; (G) gold, (F-S) silver or (SF-B) bronze Olympic medal; a (NMS) downgraded Masters Series/1000 tournament; (NH) not held. SR=strike rate (events won/competed)
To avoid confusion and double counting, these charts are updated at the conclusion of a tournament or when the player's participation has ended.

Singles performance timeline
Tournament201920202021 SR W–L Win %
Grand Slam tournaments
Australian Open A 2R 0 / 1 1–1 50%
French Open A QF 0 / 1 4–1 80%
Wimbledon Q1 NH 0 / 0 0–0  – 
US Open 1R 1R 0 / 2 0–2 0%
Win–Loss 0–1 5–3 0 / 4 5–4 56%
Career statistics
Titles 0 1 1 Career total: 2
Finals 0 1 1 Career total: 2
Year-end ranking 78 37

References
  1. "Jannik Sinner". ATP World Tour. Retrieved 22 April 2019.
  2. "Jannik Sinner, dallo sci al primo trionfo tennistico in Atp" [Jannik Sinner, from skiing to his first tennis triumph in the ATP]. Dove Sciare (in Italian). 14 November 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  3. Fraser, Stuart (17 January 2020). "Jannik Sinner: the rising teenage star 'like a young Federer'". The Sunday Times. Retrieved 17 January 2020.
  4. "Il tennista senza peccato – Jannik Sinner" [The Sinless Tennis Player – Jannik Sinner]. Dagospia (in Italian). 24 November 2019. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  5. Stonham, Marcus (2 October 2020). "Much More Than A "Sinner": Jannik Sinner, The Young Italian Who Goes For Everything At Roland Garros". TV6. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  6. Rossingh, Danielle (26 February 2020). "Meet The Former Ski Champ Who Could Be The 'Next Roger Federer'". Forbes. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  7. "Heribert Mayr, uno dei primi coach di Sinner: "Se lo rimontavo al tie-break piangeva di rabbia"" [Heribert Mayr, one of Sinner's first coaches: "If I got him back at the tie-break he would cry with anger"]. Ubi Tennis (in Italian). Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  8. "Five Things To Know About Jannik Sinner". ATP Tour. 23 May 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  9. "First-Time Winner Spotlight: Jannik Sinner". ATP Tour. 14 November 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  10. Rossingh, Danielle (29 September 2020). "Jannik Sinner: Ski champ to tennis star". Roland Garros. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  11. "Jannik Sinner Juniors Singles Activity". ITF Tennis. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  12. "Jannik Sinner Men's Singles Activity". ITF Tennis. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  13. "Jannik Sinner Men's Doubles Activity". ITF Tennis. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  14. "Jannik Sinner Rankings History". ATP Tour. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  15. "Sinner Sweeps Into Bergamo Challenger Final". Tennis TourTalk. 23 February 2019. Retrieved 23 February 2019.
  16. Meiseles, Josh (26 February 2019). "Sinner's Stunner: 17-Year-Old Reflects On Maiden Title". ATP Tour. Retrieved 26 February 2019.
  17. "On This Day In 2019: Sinner Steps Into The Spotlight". ATP Tour. 24 April 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  18. "Majchrzak Cruises Past Sinner To Clinch Ostrava Challenger Title". Tennis TourTalk. 5 May 2019. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  19. "Jannik Sinner Player Activity". ATP Tour. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  20. "Challenger Q&A: Sinner, 17, Joins Elite Company With Lexington Title". ATP Tour. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  21. "Sinner, Chung Lead US Open Qualifiers". ATP Tour. 24 August 2019. Retrieved 24 August 2019.
  22. "Sinner In The Semis: #NextGenATP Italian Makes Breakthrough In Antwerp". ATP Tour. 18 October 2019. Retrieved 18 October 2019.
  23. "18-Year-Old Shining: Sinner Shocks Monfils In Antwerp". ATP Tour. 17 October 2019. Retrieved 17 October 2019.
  24. "Kecmanovic, Humbert, Ymer, Sinner complete the 21-and-under field". ATP Tour. 25 October 2019. Retrieved 25 October 2019.
  25. "Sinner Stuns De Minaur For Milan Title". ATP Tour. 9 November 2019. Retrieved 9 November 2019.
  26. "Sinner Honoured With Newcomer Of The Year Award". ATP Tour. 19 December 2019. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  27. "Sinner Shines For First Top 10 Win In Rotterdam". ATP Tour. 13 February 2020. Retrieved 13 February 2020.
  28. "Dimitrov Impressed By Sinner: 'He Can Only Get Better'". ATP Tour. 18 September 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  29. "Sinner Eliminates Zverev To Reach Maiden Major Quarter-final". ATP Tour. 4 October 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  30. "Forget Tomorrow, Sinner is A Clear & Present Danger". ATP Tour. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  31. "Alex Zverev beats Jannik Sinner to keeps hopes of Cologne Double Alive". Eurosport. 25 October 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  32. "One Year On, Sinner Earns Second De Minaur Victory". ATP Tour. 12 November 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  33. "Sinner Makes Italian History In Sofia". ATP Tour. 13 November 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  34. "Sinner The Winner: Jannik Clinches Maiden ATP Tour Title In Sofia". ATP Tour. 14 November 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  35. O'Shannessy, Craig (30 April 2020). "Wrecking Ball: Sinner Has The Heaviest Backhand Of Them All". ATP Tour. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  36. Buddell, James (20 March 2020). "Sinner: 'I Want That Feeling More And More'". ATP Tour. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  37. Boyden, Alex (4 November 2019). "How skiing will benefit Jannik Sinner as it did for Djokovic. Hoping to reach Berrettini's heights…". Tennis Tonic. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  38. "Jannik Sinner: "I wanted to give a present for my coach's birthday"". Ubi Tennis. 9 November 2019. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
  39. "Uncovered: Sinner Sheds Light On Pizza Challenge". ATP Tour. 26 April 2020. Retrieved 15 November 2020.
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