I Am Closer Than I Expected

By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Sunday May 17, 2025

It was not the way Jannik Sinner wanted to finish his two weeks in Rome. The Italian became the first Italian men’s singles finalist at the Foro Italico since 1978, but he could not join his compatriot Jasmine Paolini in the winner’s circle.

Instead he was defeated by his main rival Carlos Alcaraz, 7-6(5), 6-1, and came back to earth a bit, as his 26-match winning streak was snapped, along with his run of 24 consecutive sets won against Top-10 players.

Sinner said the opening set, which saw him squander two set points with Alcaraz serving at 15-40, 5-6, was deflating. It certainly looked that way, as he couldn’t find a way to make the second set close as Alcaraz pulled away for his fourth consecutive win over Sinner.

“First set for sure was a little bit of a game-changer,” Sinner told reporters, before expanding on the positive strides he felt he has made in his first event in over three months.

“Talking general, [I am] very happy about this tournament. It gives me hopefully confidence to play some good tennis also in Paris. Let’s see what’s coming out there.

“After three months coming here making this result means a lot to me, a lot to my team also. We worked a lot to be here.”

Though it was a loss, Sinner says he’ll look back at the tape and try to figure out how he can make a bigger dent in his rivalry against Alcaraz.

“For sure there are some things like we saw today that we have to improve if we want to do good in Paris,” the World No.1 said. “I am closer than expected [in every way]. But in another way, it was good. It was a great week for me. Some matches [I played] incredibly well, some matches could be better. But this is tennis. It’s a lot of ups and downs.

“Everything together, it was a good, good tournament.”