With effort and brilliance: Sinner's start into a new era

Jannik Sinner played as world number one for the first time in his young career on Tuesday, and his appearance in Halle was also his first on grass this year. It lasted longer than expected and offered top-notch tennis.

June 18, 2024

From: fop

The start has been made! Jannik Sinner has moved into the round of 500 of the ATP 22 tournament in Halle/Westphalia, the first on green surface, with a hard-fought victory. The 27-year-old from Sexten defeated the great grass specialist Tallon Griekspoor (ATP 19) in two hours and 6 minutes with 7:6, 3:6, 2:XNUMX.

While a violent storm raged outside in the traditional German tennis venue, Sinner and Griekspoor had a blast under the closed roof of the hall. Both served with tremendous power and made hardly any unforced errors. The result? The first set went into a tiebreak. Sinner was ahead 5:1 at one point, but the Dutchman came back and earned two break points after a double fault from the South Tyrolean. He finally won the first set 10:8.

An incredible game changer

After that, the serve festival continued – at least until the middle of the second set, when Sinner conjured up an incredible cross shot over the net while falling and with this point landed the first break of the match to make it 4-2.

After this impressive move, Sinner himself had to smile. "I don't know how, but I managed to bring the ball back. That really cheered me up," he said after the match. After this break, he was indeed clearly on the road to victory. In the deciding set, the Pusterer player took Griekspoor's serve again when the score was 1:1. The Dutchman's strength was now waning, but Sinner seemed unleashed and finally sealed the opening victory with ease.

A déjà vu from youth

Sinner now has time to replenish his energy reserves at the Wimbledon preparation tournament. His next match is not until Thursday. He will then face 24-year-old Hungarian Fabian Marozsan. The two have never faced each other on the ATP Tour, but they did meet at a Futures tournament in Egypt in 2017. Sinner, who was still 17 at the time, was defeated there. Now he is at the top of the world rankings.

Sinner could further cement this position in Halle if he can overcome Marozsan and the other hurdles on the way to the final. These could be Stefanos Tsitsipas (ATP 11) and Daniil Medvedev (5).