Jannik Sinner makes honest admission about Carlos Alcaraz rivalry

Tennis News
Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz chat

Jannik Sinner has played down his rivalry with Carlos Alcaraz because the 20-year-old is “still a better player” and highlighted the Spaniard’s competition with Novak Djokovic as “the biggest rivalry.”

The world No 7 feels he has the potential to be a rival for Alcaraz in the future, while stressing his current focus is on improving physically.

Sinner and Alcaraz are two of the most talented and promising players on the ATP Tour and both have already enjoyed impressive results.

Alcaraz, though, has led the way among the next generation of stars – having won two Grand Slams, four Masters 1000 tournaments and reached world No 1.

Sinner has claimed eight ATP titles, with his biggest and most recent coming at the Masters 1000 event in Toronto last month.

The 22-year-old Italian has, impressively, won three of his six encounters with Alcaraz – the majority of which have been competitive and high-level clashes.

Speaking in his pre-tournament press conference ahead of the upcoming China Open, Sinner was asked about his rivalry with the world No 2.

“No, look, at the moment it’s tough to talk about this rivalry because I feel he has won so many things at the moment. I think at the moment he’s still a better player, no? He has shown this. He was No 1 in the world already couple of times,” admitted the Italian.

“I think at the moment the biggest rivalry is him and Novak. But in the other way, for sure every time when we play against, it’s a really good match. I think we both show the best out of ourself.

“At the moment I’m very focused about myself because I have to improve also physically because I feel like I have a lot of potential physically. That’s also the reason why I played much more less tournaments this year than last year, because I have to prepare the body to win the big tournaments.

“It’s going to be a question what will be answered in the future, no? I would be happy to be the rival of Carlos, for sure. I feel like that I have the potential to do it. But let’s see. It’s all about the future. We can’t say what’s happening.”

Sinner will face world No 33 Dan Evans in the opening round of the ATP 500 tournament in Beijing, which gets underway tomorrow. The No 6 seed could meet the top-seeded Alcaraz in the quarter-finals of the hard-court tournament.

READ MORE: ‘Carlos Alcaraz invigorated tennis after people were upset at Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal absence’

Carlos Alcaraz Jannik Sinner Novak Djokovic

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