Jannik Sinner defeated Jan-Lennard Struff to continue his outstanding winning streak at the start of the 2024 season.
Sinner had an incredible run to the Australian Open title in January, beating Daniil Medvedev in five sets in the final. That was followed by winning the title in Rotterdam a few weeks later.
Despite this, Sinner has dismissed being tagged as unbeatable. The Italian wants to try and stay grounded and keep working as hard as he did to make his stunning Grand Slam success in Melbourne possible.
A recent event in Indian Wells may have helped to keep the 22-year-old humble. Sinner lost a point to a young fan, with this humorous event being shared many times on social media.
Struff represented a different challenge to many players on the ATP Tour. The German has one of the best serves in tennis, meaning Sinner was going to have to stay focused and accept periods where he could not create chances.
In fact, it was Struff who created the first break point in the third game of that match. But Sinner saw off that danger with some composed play, which turned out to be a crucial moment in the set.
Sinner made Struff pay in the very next game. He took his first break point chance of the match to lead 3-1, and it was clear from Struff's body language that he knew it was going to be hard to recover after that.
The Italian was very comfortable on his serve throughout the rest of the set. He took the set 6-3 with some cool and composed tennis.
Sinner got even better at the start of the second set. He was close to faultless on return and with his groundstrokes, and understandably, Struff simply could not keep up with the Australian Open champion from the baseline.
It meant the German needed to serve perfectly, and that was always going to be a tough ask against Sinner in this form in slow conditions. A backhand passing shot gave Sinner his second break in the fifth game to make it 3-2.
Sinner had another chance to break in his next return game. But to Struff's credit, he hit a terrific backhand down the line to hold and keep his faint hopes of a comeback alive.
Those hopes briefly looked possible when Sinner's level dropped in his next game to trail 15-40 on his serve. However, he stayed composed to play four excellent points and cut out Struff's route back into the match.
Sinner held his next service game more easily to seal a 6-3 6-4 win. He dealt with a potentially awkward opponent impressively, and it will require an outstanding performance from one of his future opponents to knock him off his stride.
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