Devil’s sport, there’s little to say. Jannik Sinner raises the white flag precisely in the tournament that has reserved him the greatest disappointments to date: retirement in the round of 16 against Rublev in 2022, defeat in the second round in five sets against Altmaier in 2023 and last year’s final against Alcaraz with those three match points not capitalized.

It’s an unpleasant exercise to rank the disappointments, but we believe today’s defeat against Juan Manuel Cerundolo may have earned first place in the sumptuous career of our phenomenon. It’s difficult to arrive at a tournament as a favorite more than Sinner was at this Roland Garros. That’s why this knockout hurts so much.

Could/should have skipped Madrid?

It was the great doubt that accompanied all his followers during the last three extraordinary months. Wasn’t playing all the Masters 1000 games non-stop, winning them and therefore playing a considerable number of matches, perhaps a gamble? The double in Indian Wells and Miami, then the triptych Monte Carlo, Madrid and Rome. In the end, we put the doubt back in our pocket. How do you tell the best player in the world to stay in the pits? Go and win all you can, boy, we celebrate with you.

The semi-final against Medvedev in Rome had been classified as a small wake-up call but nothing more. There was the Career Golden Masters to celebrate – the youngest ever to do so -, a streak of 29 consecutive matches won to increase (which became 30 after the success in the first round in Paris) and the number one seat ever more firmly in his hands.

Yet, in his pocket that doubt, every now and then, made itself felt. It is very true that Jannik will be able to win any Slam against any opponent, but when will he ever play two majors like Roland Garros and Wimbledon without Carlitos Alcaraz at the starting line?

The opportunity exploited by Federer

Such bonuses should never be wasted, history teaches. When Soderling eliminated an otherwise battered Nadal from Roland Garros 2009, King Roger Federer didn’t have to do it twice. He had that chance and he took advantage of that chance to also put his signature in the red cathedral of tennis. After that edition, despite another final (again lost to Rafa), he never had a chance again.

Since luck is blind, but bad luck sees very well, Jannik was betrayed by his body at the worst moment. In the first rounds, when the opponents have little to lose and a lot of fuel in their bodies. And so Juan Manuel Cerundolo, younger and less strong than his brother Francisco, arrived in Paris as world number 56 and after winning the Bordeaux Challenger, committed the perfect crime: in two hours of tennis he had barely touched the ball. Then, down 6-3, 6-2 and 5-1, the devil’s sport handed him the scalp of the best player on the planet on a silver platter.

And so that damned doubt came out of his pocket and gave us a nice raspberry, especially to us devoted followers of Sinner. Try explaining to him that five more minutes and the blue would have eliminated the young Cerundolo in three sets, because he already has another question ready: in twenty years, will six Masters 1000 won consecutively or one more Roland Garros on the board matter more?

Infinite bitterness, but luckily there is Wimbledon

Grown-ups don’t lose, but learn. The world number 1, we are sure, will also learn from this stop. And the opportunity to repeat the success at the Championships is the best way to move on. Last year the grass of London managed to mitigate the bitterness for that Roland Garros that escaped him by nothing. This year history could repeat itself, also because Sinner will also be the big favorite at Church Road.

The real reflection, net of the programming, instead brings us back to Jannik’s difficulties when the match gets longer and the conditions become complicated. Out of 18 times in which he was forced to play the fifth set, the Italian champion prevailed only on six occasions.

Lendl and Djokovic

When Djokovic was forced to retire during the most important events at the beginning of his career, he changed everything (nutrition, training, staff, probably even the bubble bath…) in order to perform to the best of his ability, and sometimes even beyond, in the decisive phases of the slams.

Ivan Lendl had done the same two decades earlier, the first to make every aspect of his professional life maniacal. A young Pete Sampras described a couple of weeks of training at the Lendl house in these terms: “As I arrived at Ivan’s house, I struggled not to believe I was a guest at a military academy. From a computer printer I was given the program for the following two weeks. We started in the morning at half past six with aerobic exercises, and continued until I was exhausted. As the Masters began, Ivan decreased his workload. But he followed me in the car while I pedaled. One day when I was weak, he threatened to unleash the worst of his wolves on me.”.

Jannik has a lot in common with Djokovic, Lendl and Sampras in terms of mentality and way of approaching the tennis profession. Bringing body and mind to their peak in the two weeks of a Slam: this is where the careers of the greatest are truly measured.

Roland Garros is a tournament that doesn’t give discounts, very tough from the first rounds and which forces you to play in complicated and always different conditions: very hot, windy, maybe it’s raining and you have to wait hours in the locker room, or in the evening and you end up very late with very heavy balls. Here, more than anywhere else, you must arrive with a full tank.

Now another tournament begins

Jannik out, it’s as if today, after the match point converted by Cerundolo, another tournament had begun. Where there is not a single favorite, but at least a dozen. And this says a lot about the tyranny imposed by the Sinner-Alcaraz duumvirate. At the top of the scoreboard, looking at the rankings, the designated semi-finalists should have been Sinner and Medvedev, but both have already left the tournament, just as the top seeds Bublik, Griekspoor, Vacherot, Norrie and also Luciano Darderi have already been eliminated, also surprised in five by another Argentine, Comesana.

Doors wide open therefore in that slice of the draw for Flavio Cobolli, with Shelton, Tien, Auger-Aliassime and Tiafoe to keep an eye on because they are capable of expressing top-level tennis.

The best players remaining in the competition are concentrated in the lower part. In order of ranking and quality on clay we find Zverev, Djokovic, De Minaur and Ruud, but watch out for the new player who advances represented above all by the Brazilian Fonseca and the Spanish Jodar.

Everything for Zverev

If we were to exclusively consider ATP points, experience and characteristics suitable for this surface, everything should lead to Alexander Zverev or Novak Djokovic. For Sasha it is yet another huge opportunity to enter the club of slam winners. Player who has won a lot and everywhere (except on grass), as demonstrated by the 24 titles on the circuit, including two editions of the ATP Finals, the Olympic gold in Tokyo and three finals reached in the majors but always eluding him. The first is the most painful and risks marking a fantastic career. US Open 2020 against Thiem, the German leading by two sets, a break and in the fifth capable of serving for the match, only to then lose it in the tie-break.

Immediately after, quietly, there is Nole, the man who has achieved most of the records in this sport. To date, she shares with Margaret Smith Court in having lifted 24 Grand Slam titles. It is superfluous to point out when Djoker would like to be the only one to reach 25. To do so, however, he would have to overcome several complicated challenges with a potentially high expenditure of energy. The first big obstacle is the baby Joao Fonseca, born in 2005. Then one between Ruud and Paul in the round of 16 and, on paper, the world number 8 Alex De Minaur in the quarterfinals. Zverev could instead be waiting for him in the semi-final.

The Djokovic of even just three years ago would already have the Musketeers Cup in his pocket. Having just won two matches after the final reached at the start of the season in Australia, we don’t believe he can achieve this much. Although with the man of 432 weeks at the top of the ATP rankings the word impossible does not exist.