One year after losing the Italian open final to his rival Carlos Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner is back in the championship match.
After struggling to breathe and facing a right thigh issue and a bout of cramps on Friday in his semifinal with No. 7 Daniil Medvedev, world No. 1 Sinner got a respite when the match was called because of rain with Sinner leading by a break in the third set.
Following a 17-hour break, the two men returned to the court under sunny skies in Rome where Sinner took care of business against the 2023 Italian Open champ, winning 6-2, 5-7, 6-4, closing it out with a backhand crosscourt winner. The Italian has now won 33 matches in a row; he improved to 10-7 against Medvedev.
Sinner will now attempt to make more history in Sunday’s final against No. 23 Casper Ruud. Sinner leads the series 4-0.
He is bidding for his sixth straight ATP Masters 1000 title and his fifth straight of 2026. If he hoists the trophy in his home country, he will tie Novak Djokovic as the only men to win all nine Masters 1000 titles.
“I had a bad loss to Jannik here last year and sort of got smoked and didn’t really have much to push him with or challenge him with,” Rudd said Friday on Tennis Channel, referring to his 6-0, 6-1 loss in last year’s quarterfinals.
“But Sunday’s a new year, a new day, a new tournament, so I will just try to be as positive as I can and let’s see what happens here. If it is Jannik, I’m going to be the one who tries to stop him from getting all three Masters 1000s on the clay [Madrid, Monte Carlo, Rome].”
Rudd added of Sinner, the betting favorite at the French Open later this month.
“He sort of looks unplayable & unbeatable these days,” he said. “But you have to just try to think, he is human, too…When you keep winning and winning , you will get closer to that first loss in a while. You just hope, whenever I show up, that will be the day. But I guess I just have to think that raising your level one level is not going to be enough against this guy, you have to raise it two, three or four times and then see if you can hang with him from there. If I want to have a chance to beat him, I will have to play my best match of the year, and let’s try to do that.”
Sinner threw up on court on Friday against Medvedev and also called for a medical timeout due to a right thigh issue that was perceived by some to be cramps. The Russian accused the Italian of receiving “special treatment” after the physio came out.
“When we call the physio for cramps, we don’t get fined?” Medvedev told the umpire in French.
Under ATP rules, players can’t received medical timeouts for cramps unless it is during the time allotted for changeovers or set breaks..
Medvedev said he has a solution to the issue.
“Actually, first I wanted to say impossible to sell, but I actually have a solution,” he told reporters.
“Allow physical, allow medical treatment for help… sorry, allow medical, meaning physio. Three minutes, when you have cramps.
“Then there’s no problem, because then a player could say, I have cramps, I need a physio.
“For the moment, it’s not allowed. I completely understand.
“Of course, if you start cramping – maybe he was not, I have no idea – what you do, is you ask for a physio and you say, I have a small pain in the leg. Probably, I did it as well in my career.”
Said Sinner: “I struggled a bit to sleep this night. It has been a situation I haven’t been in yet, where you need to finish when you’re nearly over with the match. You sleep, you don’t know what’s coming out the next day. Yeah, I think it’s normal that not every day we feel 100%. I tried to play with the best possible energy I have. Yesterday brought me to a point where I was up today. Today I’m very happy that I finished it.”
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