Sinner is “flying in seventh heaven” this season, just a few months after nearly falling into the “hell of a doping scandal that has caused a lot of controversy”.
From the Australian Open to the Rotterdam Open. From the Miami Masters to the Halle Open. From the Cincinnati Open to the US Open and now the Shanghai Masters. 7 titles in 2024.
With this achievement, Jannik Sinner not only became “The first Italian tennis player to win the Shanghai Masters”, he also became the first person after the Big Three + 1 generation (Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic + Andy Murray) to win at least 7 titles in 1 season.
“It was a very difficult match, obviously, playing against Novak Djokovic – one of the biggest challenges we have,” Sinner said after the final.
“I was very happy with the way I handled the situation. He served really well in the first set, I couldn’t find a way to break his serve!”
“Then I played a really good tie-break, which gave me a lot of confidence going into the second set,” Sinner said after winning 24 of 32 tie-breaks this season.
“It’s hard to tell you a secret about Djokovic, because he doesn’t have any weaknesses. You have to try and take advantage of the smallest opportunities he gives you.”
“But chances like that, they didn’t come around that often during the match. He’s one of the legends of our sport. He’s very difficult to defend against. So I’m very happy with this win,” Sinner said happily at the awards ceremony.
While Sinner is “flying in seventh heaven”, completely leaving behind his worries about his CAS appeal of his doping case, Djokovic is full of weaknesses, not as Sinner describes.
He is not in good physical condition, which was evident at the end of yesterday’s match against Taylor Fritz (USA). He has also not been in good mental condition since winning the Olympic gold medal.
Djokovic in his “last days” no longer has the resilient mentality he always had, that when pushed to the limit, even though he plays “weakly”, he still finds a way to win.
It’s happened a lot this season: “give up” losses. And today’s final was the clearest example. After losing the tie-break, Djokovic let himself go.
He did the same when he lost to Sinner in the Australian Open semi-finals in January, when he lost all three sets to Carlos Alcaraz in the Wimbledon semi-finals, when he lost easily to Alexei Popyrin in the third round of the US Open in August – winning the opening set but losing the last three.
So, Djokovic still “paused” at 99. Perhaps, this year’s season is “over” for the former world No. 1 Serbian tennis player. It will be difficult for him to do anything more from now until the end of the season.
Perhaps, let’s wait for Djokovic to come back a little fresher next season. Although what we have seen throughout this year, except for the Paris Olympics, shows that Djokovic’s time with us is not too much longer!
He was old, and tired. He no longer had much desire to compete with the young generation that was especially vigorous, like Sinner, and even Alcaraz!
