Considered to carry the hallmarks to be the88 greatest tennis player championing the modern day new guard as the WTA No. 1 seed, the colorfully flashy and most astutely composed in the center court, Italian Jannik Sinner walkedl – out of the recent controversial blot of a 3-month dope related ban that many including contemporaries felt was unfair, to a rainbow colouring meeting up with Pope Leo XIV at the Vatican in Rome wheret he presented the new American Pope, himself a keen tennis player in his hey day and still an enthusiast with a tennis racquet on Wednesday May 12.
The meeting with the Papal accompanied by his parents was an apparent shot in the arm stock raising moment to shedding the drug stigma in an otherwise fabulous early career that he has stamped his name as an ace as Sinner, ushered into a waiting room at the Vatican voiced, ‘It’s an honour’ before the much looked to meet up with the new 69-year old Pope whom he presented a tennis racquet and promised to return for a game of tennis on an off day during the ongoing Internationazionali BNL d’Italia in Rome which he entered with his best foot forward in a redoubling winning vein to the quarter finals.
The face to face meet up between the world tennis great who has brought a magnetic image of a brimming young new order replacing an old guard, the last bastion of which a fading all time great Novak Djokovic, with the Pope had a memorable tinge arising from the common love both have for the sport that had driven Pope Leo XIV to agreeing to journalists suggestion to take part in a doubles or charity match that caused the Pope to jest in lighter vein saying, ‘but we can’t invite Sinner’ in an apparent reference to the English meaning of the player’s surname.
In a lead up to the noble meeting with the Pope, Sinner, quick to noting the Pope’s common bonding for the sport, had made a welcome comment saying, ‘it’s “a good thing for us tennis players” that the new pope likes to play the sport” unfazed by by Leo XIV’s reported joked about the world No. 1’s last name.
Indeed, Jannik Sinner has been an epitome of youth, color highlighted by catchy attire, tufts of red curly hair harmonizing in a work horse perseverance of absolute on court composure to signalling greatness which he described as a “new chapter is starting” after he became the first Italian to top the world rankings.
SURPASSED DJOKOVIC
At age 22 he surpassed Novak Djokovic as world number one in 2024 pushing the Serb to third after 39 weeks at the top.
Sinner marked his rise in 2024 which was a truly golden groove on the way to winning the Australian Open in January and the Miami Open in March 5.
Having reached the semi-finals of the French Open, he lost the finals to Carlos Alcaraz in five sets.
At the 2024 Australian Open, Sinner defeated world No. 1 Novak Djokovic and then Daniil Medvedev in a five-set final, coming back from two sets down to win his first major title. He followed by winning three Masters 1000 events, the US Open, and the ATP Finals to finish the year as the world No. 1. In 2025, Sinner defended his Australian Open title, following which he served a three-month WADA suspension regarding a doping case from the prior season.
PLAYING STYLE
Doing all Italy proud as its first ever to put his country on top of the tennis world, Sinner’s greatest asset has been an unwerving aggressive baseline playing style. That he has coupled style and court craft in being regarded as the most unruffled player whose game has been built on iron like composure has set Jannik Sinner apart representing s new tennis generation. Sinner’s two handed backhand groundstroke strength is impeccable producing with more topspin than any other player on the tour, registering an average of 1858 revolutions per minute on the shot along with the fifth-best average speed of 111.2 km/h (69.1 mph).
Sinner’s rapid rise to stardom has caused experts to compare him to Roger Federer for his calm on-court demeanour and all-court movement.with Federer himself having 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.”
Also, the former world No. 1 junior and tennis coach Claudio Pistolesi has been quick to hail Sinner’s good lateral movement, which he attributes in part to Sinner’s background in skiing.[193] In this regard, Sinner has also been compared to Novak Djokovic, who also credits a background in skiing for improving his tennis skills.
Sinner is known to play with contact lenses and has stated that he cannot even see the ball without them.
As a junior, Sinner did not enjoy the best of success.
He went on to playing in professional men’s events aged 16, and became one of the few players to win multiple ATP Challenger Tour titles at age 17. In 2019, he broke into the top 100, winning the Next Generation ATP Finals and the ATP Newcomer of the Year award.
In 2021, he hit the jackpot becoming the youngest ATP 500 champion at the Washington Open, and the first player born in the 2000s to enter the top 10 in rankings. Sinner won his first Masters 1000 title at the 2023 Canadian Open and finished the season by reaching the final of the ATP Finals and leading Italy to the Davis Cup crown.
FORMATIVE YEARS
Sinner won his first ATP Challenger title by in Bergamo in February 2019 at the age of 17 years and 6 months 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.
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.[26] The next week, he reached his second ATP Challenger final in Ostrava, finishing runner-up to Kamil Majchrzak.
During the second half of the season Sinner played more often on the ATP Tour than the Challenger Tour.
His first ATP Masters victory came at the Italian Open against Steve Johnson, and he broke into the top 200 with his next ATP win at the Croatia Open Umag in July. 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. After losing in qualifying at Wimbledon, Sinner qualified for his first Grand Slam main draw at the US Open. He lost his debut match to No. 24 Stan Wawrinka.
A wild card at the European Open, he became the youngest player in five years to reach an ATP semifinal. It was great stuff going on to knock out top seed and world No. 13 Gaël Monfils for his first career top 50 victory. This performance helped him break into the top 100 for the first time one week later. At the end of the season, Sinner qualified for the 2019 Next Gen ATP Finals as the Italian wild card and the lowest seed.
Sinner won in the round robin group over Frances Tiafoe and Mikael Ymer, losing only to Ugo Humbert.
He beat Miomir Kecmanović in the semifinals and upset top seed and world No. 18 Alex de Minaur in straight sets to win the title. He played one last event in Italy the following week, winning a third Challenger title in Ortisei. Sinner finished the year at world No. 78.
He was thus the youngest player in the year-end top 80 since Rafael Nadal in 2003. He was also named ATP Newcomer of the Year. and received the Gazzetta Sport Award for Best Performance of the Year for his win over de Minaur in the Next Gen ATP Finals.
In 2020: First ATP title, top 40. Early that year Sinner enterrd the second round of the 2020 Australian Open, winning his first Grand Slam main draw match against home wild card Max Purcell before losing to Márton Fucsovics. As a wild card at the Rotterdam Open, he earned his first top 10 victory against world No. 10 David Goffin.
In the post-COVID related ATP Tour shutdown Sinner had a successful restart to the season. He lost the opening round match to Karen Khachanov at the US Open, but fared better in Europe reaching the third round at the Rome Masters showcased by a victory over world No. 6 Stefanos Tsitsipas. He was to become 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.
After a semifinal at the Cologne Championship, where he lost to Zverev, Sinner ended the season winning the Sofia Open for his first ATP title. During the event, he defeated Next Gen rival Alex de Minaur and then Vasek Pospisil in the fina and 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.
Sinner finished that year ranked world No. 37.
In 2021 he won four titles, Masters final, top 10
Sinner at the 2021 French Open was standout He carried over his success from late 2020 into the start of the 2021from where he has grown from strength to strength.