Novak Djokovic Says Jannik Sinner is ‘Leader’ of Next-Gen Tennis

Vienna’s top-seed Novak Djokovic faced a tough time against his Croatian opponent Borna Coric to reserve his quarterfinal spot at ATP Vienna 2020. In the first set, the Serbian maestro fended off a total of four set points and later sealed his win in the second set. Moving further, in the post-match presser, Novak mulled over the club of Next-Gen stars on the ATP circuit and commended the rising star from Italy, Jannik Sinner.

The Serb hailed Sinner, who possesses a clean game of tennis, silhouetted with extreme power and precision. The teenager has been proven to better than young elite tennis players like Alexander Zverev and Stefanos Tsitsipas. Also, in the fourth of French Open 2020, Sinner dodged past reigning US Open finalist Sascha and earned his first-ever Grand Slam quarterfinal ticket.

“Leader of the guys younger”-  Novak Djokovic on Jannik Sinner

“I definitely see a lot of quality in the young players,” said Novak Djokovic. “[Sinner] definitely possesses a game that is powerful and is with a lot of quality, and you can say he has the potential to be a top player of the world.”

“Sinner is definitely, I would say, the leader of the guys younger than Zverev and Tsitsipas, who I think by many experts’ opinions [is] the next ‘top’ top player.”

Both Zverev and Tsitsipas have proved themselves on London’s hardcourt by claiming the ATP Finals title. And Dominic Thiem has entered the ‘aristocrat club’ of men’s tennis by triumphing in New York and also reaching multiple Slams finals from NextGen’s section.

“These are the guys of the ‘next’ generation, so to speak. They’re still very young, but they have a lot of titles. Both Zverev and Tsitsipas won the [Nitto ATP] Finals, which after Slams is the biggest event in our sport. So those guys are already established top guys. I can’t speak of them as ‘potential’ in tennis, because they already have achieved some great heights in tennis can,” Djokovic added.

On Wednesday, Serbian legendary tennis player Novak Djokovic surpassed Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal’s record in the year-end World Number one ranking.

The ‘Fedal’ pair have previously concluded the season five-times on the ATP’s apex, and in 2020 their foe Djokovic will be doing it for the sixth time in his career and simultaneously tying with the legend Pete Sampras’ year-end World Number one ranking.