Jannik Sinner will be champing at the bit to get Wimbledon underway as he looks to get back in the winner’s circle at a Grand Slam event.
The Italian performer was two sets up on Carlos Alcaraz in the final of the French Open but succumbed to a brilliant fightback from the Spaniard to lose.
Sinner had Championship points in set four of the match, but after Alcaraz saved them all he went on to claim a second successive title at Roland Garros.
Clearly, it was a huge blow for Sinner to lose in such circumstances, but as the world number one, he will know that another Grand Slam won’t be too far away.
This year is the final year that Sinner will work with Darren Cahill as his long-serving coach sails off into the sunset and calls time on his career in tennis.
Darren Cahill shares what he told Jannik Sinner after losing French Open final
Any sportsman would find it tough to lose from two sets up, even if the opposition were just too good on that particular day.
Cahill now has a duty to get back to work with Sinner and help him work on the situations that didn’t go according to plan at the French Open when Wimbledon gets underway.
Sinner is yet to win a title at the All England Club, and it will be interesting to see if there is anything fundamentally different about the Italian when he gets to work at the next Grand Slam.
Cahill has been quizzed over what he said to Sinner on the Served podcast with Andy Roddick and he’s confessed that he’s not needed to say much at all.
He said: “We barely said anything, to be perfectly honest, after the match, there was disappointment, he sat and locked the room for 15 or 20 minutes. Each one of us from his team came up and gave him a hug. And we told him we were really proud of him, proud of his effort.
“But that’s not the perfect time to give him a speech about what we can learn from it, we’re going to move on from it. You have to show a little bit of empathy for what he’s going through. Sadness, a few tears, a few tears for everybody.
“But I’ve got to say, later that night, a few hours later, he wasn’t over. He’s never going to be over it. I think a match like that stays with you forever, and you try to become better for it, but he has great perspective as to the importance of playing a tennis match, compared to real life, and there’s much more important things going on, and certainly in his life, there’s going to be much more important things than winning or losing a tennis match.
“And I think that’s where the self-awareness comes full on. It’s that, yes, it was disappointing, but it’s just sports. It’s just a tennis match. Go out there and have as much fun as you can and go next time and can turn us around and we’ll try to get better from this.”
Sinner could be extremely dangerous at Wimbledon
Not only will Sinner be keen to make amends for the defeat he suffered to Alcaraz at the French Open, but he might also be looking to right some wrongs from Wimbledon last year.
He was sent packing in the quarter-finals by Daniil Medvedev, and that represented a disappointing campaign for the player who is the comfortable world number one.
Sinner will be keen to win every Grand Slam there is to win many times over, and the fact that he’s not won Wimbledon yet will upset him a bit.
It’s intriguing that Cahill didn’t feel the need to say much to him and that should relax him ahead of another attempt at winning Wimbledon later this month.
Sinner shouldn’t beat himself up after one defeat and from a tennis fan perspective, the hope will be that he and Alcaraz can renew their rivalry once again at Wimbledon.
Receive exclusive tennis news and updates twice a week to your mailbox
