Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner are ’10 per-cent’ better than Federer, Nadal and Djokovic
Plenty of high-profile voices in tennis have suggested Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner are playing the best tennis in the history of the sport and now one of the current top ten in the world has joined that chorus.
Former world No 1 Mats Wilander caused a stir when he claimed the top two players in the world right now are playing tennis that is a level or two ahead of the performances served up by the iconic trio of Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.
Even though the ‘Big 3’ have all won 20 or more Grand Slam titles and Alcaraz and Sinner are still at the start of their careers, Wilander made his claims in an interview with Eurosport.
“They are following in the footsteps of the ‘Big Three’ in terms of level,” said Wilander.
“I hope Roger, Novak, and Rafa are not listening, but in terms of level, when Sinner and Alcaraz are at their best, there is no way anyone has ever played better tennis, that the tennis ball has done more different, complicated, difficult things than the ball is doing between Sinner and Alcaraz.”
Those comments were backed up by British tennis star Liam Broady, who reluctantly admitted Alcaraz and Sinner have taken tennis to the next level over the last 18 months after watching their latest battle at the Six Kings Slam in Saudi Arabia.
“It was an absolutely incredible match,” Broady told Sky Sports Tennis. “They can’t seem to help themselves from creating constant highlight reels across three-set matches.
“The ball striking is some of the best I’ve ever seen and I hate to say that as I’m a ‘Big 3’ fan, but they hit the ball so big and so consistently big. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Now another high-profile contributor to this debate has given some unique insight, with world No 6 Taylor Fritz suggesting Alcaraz and Sinner hit the ball harder and with more venom than Federer, Nadal and Djokovic.
With these observations coming from a current top ten player who has lived through the ‘Big 3’ era, Fritz’s views carry plenty of weight.
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Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz hailed as ‘better’ than Federer, Nadal and Djokovic
“One thing both of those guys do is… their defence is incredible,” Fritz told the Tennis Channel.
“They don’t really play that much defence. When they are full on the run out in the corners, they just crush the ball.
“I can be in a backhand cross (court) rally with either one of them and if I hit a forehand, it’s got to be so good or else that next ball is getting just drilled huge cross court.
“They just play these lateral baseline points… like we used to see Nadal and Fed and most you saw Nadal and Novak have these long points, corner to corner.
“When Sinner and Alcaraz do it corner to corner, they have these same rallies but I swear they are hitting the ball ten miles an hour faster. It’s just crazy.”
Getting insight from a player currently operating at the top of the game as he compared Alcaraz and Sinner to the game’s all-time greats will add to the debate about the quality of tennis we are seeing from the game’s top two male players right now.
We didn’t believe the generation of tennis players who followed in the footsteps of Federer, Nadal and Djokovic could be better than the three most successful players the men’s game has ever seen, but the new ‘Big 2’ are raising standards to new heights.
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