When Daniil Medvedev led the Australian Open final 6-3, 6-3, 4-4, Jannik Sinner turned to his coaching team and declared: “I’m dead.” Two games later, the Italian won the third set and began an incredible recovery that led him to win his first Grand Slam title. A long-awaited title due to the excellent tennis that Sinner has shown in recent months, but which Medvedev put in doubt with a high-level start to the match. However, he ended up leaving Rod Laver Arena as the first tennis player to lose two Grand Slam finals, after leading by two sets a zero.
Sinner won his first Grand Slam title in his first appearance in tournament finals at this level, defeating Medvedev, 3-6, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 and 6-3, after 3h44m. The 27-year-old Russian had a break-point a 3-3 do quarto setcanceled out by an ace from Sinner, but the more than 24 hours spent on the court throughout the fortnight began to take a toll on the legs and arms and, at 2-3 of the fifth set (and with more than three and a half hours of play), he fatally gave up the service.
Upon completing the first match-pointSinner became the third Italian to win a title major (and the first in Australia), succeeding Nicola Pietrangeli, champion at Roland Garros in 1959 and 1960, and Adriano Panatta, winner of the same tournament in 1976.
At 22, he is the youngest tennis player to lift the Norman Brookes Challenge Cup since 2008 – when Novak Djokovic won his first majoraged 20.
“I wish everyone had the parents I have, because they always let me choose what I wanted to do, even when I was younger. I played other sports and they never put pressure on me and I would like as many children as possible to have this freedom”, said the first Open champion since 2014 who does not belong to the Big 3 (Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal).
In addition to his parents, watching from Tirol, Sinner extended his thanks to the technical team… for putting up with him. “I’m still a little young sometimes, but it is what it is,” joked the number four in the world rankings.
Sinner confirmed that he was the best tennis player at the moment: the Italian had finished 2023 leading Italy to win the Davis Cup for the first time since 1976 and defeating Novak Djokovic, leader of the ATP table, twice in the space of a week.