Who is Jannik Sinner’s coach? Darren Cahill opens up ahead of the Australian Open final

Oliver Paton
Pictured: Jannik Sinner and Darren Cahill
Jannik Sinner and Darren Cahill have worked together since 2022

Renowned coach Darren Cahill joined Jannik Sinner’s team in July 2022 and he has played a key role in the Italian’s rise to the top of the world’s ranking.

However, 2025 will be the last year of the successful player-coach relationship – with the Australian hanging up his coaching boots for good.

Over the years, Cahill has coached four world No 1’s and four Grand Slam champions. His CV includes players such as Lleyton Hewitt, Andre Agassi, Andy Murray, Simona Halep, and Fernando Verdasco.

It was Hewitt whom he first coached, and it grew to be a fruitful one, with the Wimbledon finalist becoming the youngest male player to reach the world No 1 ranking. This record was subsequently broken by Carlos Alcaraz in 2022.

One of the reasons for his success is that the Australian was a professional player himself, reaching a career-high ranking of world No 22 in singles and No 10 in doubles. His playing career accolades include two titles and reaching the US Open semi-finals in 1988.

Recently, he has helped coach Sinner to become the youngest player to reach consecutive singles finals at the Australian Open since Pete Sampras in 1994-1995, and the second youngest man to win 20 or more consecutive hard court Grand Slam matches.

Speaking ahead of Sinner’s 2025 Australian Open final against Alexander Zverev, Cahill followed a familiar script as he insisted he was just a minor player in the Italian’s success story.

“Honestly, I don’t want to make this in any way about me. We’re concentrating on Jannik making the final, playing Zverev. This is not about me. This is about Jannik,” said the Australian.

“A coach is truly effective for a period of three, four or at most five years. The work that Simone Vagnozzi is carrying out is of incredible quality. Sinner is in very good hands and the successes will continue to arrive.”

Of course, the current world No 1 will need a replacement coach – alongside Vagnozzi – once Cahill leaves, with several high-profile names being linked with the lucrative vacancy.

“We spoke to Andre (Agassi) today – he’s a big fan of Jannik’s, loves the way he plays,” said the Australian.

“Always hearing words from him about what he sees from Jannik’s game and where the improvements are coming from and where he still feels there could be more improvement in Jannik’s game.”

Sinner’s coach also spoke to comparisons between the Italian and Agassi himself.

“They play similar in ways, but in other ways completely different. No two players are the same, no two players see a tennis match the same way,” he continued.

“I think that Andre is an incredible champion of the game who won eight Majors, every Major, and a gold medal.

“So Jannik is far from that, he’s on the way, like a couple of other players as well.

“There are similarities but they’re also very different people.”

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However, 2024 was an especially tough season for the Sinner team – despite the results.

In March, the Italian failed two separate doping tests with clostebol – a banned anabolic steroid – being detected in his bloodstream.

This result was not made public, whilst the team appealed the ITIA decision to the Court of Arbitration of Sport (CAS) – arguing their side of the story. In August, whilst competing in Cincinnati, the team won their appeal.

However, just when Sinner may have thought the saga was over, the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) appealed to the CAS decision, and this is due to be heard in April.

Sinner has commented on various occasions about the toll the positive tests took on him mentally, something Cahill also remarked upon.

“It’s not easy to come back and defend a major for the first time in your career and he’s had some stuff to deal with,” he stated.

“We couldn’t be prouder of the way that he’s conducted himself, both on and off the court, the fight he’s shown, the resilience.

“Nobody’s bulletproof – I think we all have moments when it gets to you a little bit, but I think to a large extent he finds playing tennis matches to be his safe place.

“That’s where he can go and do his thing and feel like this is what he knows, this is what he understands, what is what he’s good at. It’s become a home for him to step onto the court and play tennis.

“There’s been a lot of pressure around him for the last nine months now but he deals with it as well as anybody that I’ve ever seen deal with pressure. He’s an amazing young man who’s been able to put that to one side.

“What will be will be. We don’t know what’s going to happen, but he can always hold his head up high and be proud of what he’s been able to achieve.”

The 2025 Australian Open between Sinner and Zverev will be the first men’s singles final between the top two seeds since the 2019 final between Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal.

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