Seasoned veteran Pablo Carreno Busta doesn't think that Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz will easily dominate the coming decade on the ATP Tour, as there will be challengers along the way.
Carreno Busta has been around for a while, and while he was a very young player when Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal dominated the Tour, his lived experience showed him that challengers would arise along the way. First, it was Novak Djokovic, who ended up actually overtaking both of them in the pecking order.
After that, there were solid players who at times really disrupted things. Marin Cilic won a Grand Slam during that time. Stan Wawrinka won three of them. Andy Murray, of course, proved a proper challenger for many years, so while they were clearly the best, there were players along the way that challenged them for trophies.
Alcaraz and Sinner are both two very young tennis players, but even so, they're already some of the best players in the world. This year's four Grand Slams were split between them, as Alcaraz won Roland Garros and Wimbledon, while Sinner won the Australian Open and the US Open.
Some have already suggested that these players will dominate the sport in the coming decade, and while Carreno Busta agrees that they could, he warned against taking it as a given. As he told Punto de Break, there will be challengers along the way.
“They are still very young, both Sinner and Carlos. It's clear that they are very good, but we already take it for granted that they will reign for the next 20 years like Roger, Rafa and Novak did.”
As Carreno Busta went on to explain, many things can happen, from good to bad. Sometimes, a player can come up and totally disrupt the course of tennis history—that's what Djokovic largely did. Sometimes, an injury can derail a career, and these things are as unlikely as they are likely.
“Many things can happen, it is not easy to maintain the level of demand for so long, or the level of success to share the four grand slams, as has happened this year.”
“New people can also come along, another very good player can appear who is four years younger than Carlos, for example. I don't think that the future belongs only to these two players, others will come along who will make things difficult for them, but it looks like these two will be there for many, many years.”
What is certain, though, is that these players will control what they can control. They will work hard and try to improve to become their best version. Everything else is unknown, and only time will tell how things ultimately unfold. There are many reasons to be excited because tennis is in very good hands.
For a very long time, many tennis enthusiasts were worried about what would happen when the Big Three retire. Well, it seems that these two will usher in a new era of tennis.