The battle between the current and former World No. 1s took place on Wimbledon's Centre Court, where Jannik Sinner and Novak Djokovic played a practice match.
Ahead of the draw, which will be released on Friday, Sinner and Djokovic rubbed shoulders one more time on the pristine grass. The Serbian has defeated Sinner in the last two Wimbledon editions in the quarterfinal and semifinal stages.
The world's top-ranked players have been acclimating to the courts in SW19 since arriving from Roland Garros, although a few others have gotten some much-needed mileage in warm-up tournaments like Queen's and Halle.
Sinner, for instance, was in action this past week in Halle, where he won his first career title on grass. Djokovic, however, has not played a competitive match since defeating Francisco Cerundolo in the fourth round of Roland Garros.
After that match, he withdrew from the tournament because of a knee injury and underwent surgery. His participation at this year's Wimbledon was in severe jeopardy, but he is upbeat about playing in the tournament starting Monday, July 1st, having recovered from the setback.
Djokovic has already played some practice sets with a knee brace, and his most recent practice match was against World No. 1 Sinner. The reported score was that the Italian led 6-3, but Djokovic was 2-1 up in the second set with a break of serve when they left the court.
Tennis journalist David Law, who watched the practice set, told The Tennis Podcast that he was impressed by Djokovic's level and reckons the seven-time champion will play in the tournament next week.
"If he hadn't got a knee brace on, watching him today I would not have known that there is much wrong with him. Yes, I think you could say he is maybe protecting a little bit of his movement, he's not going full pelt into the corners and sliding out, but there was certainly enough there to make me think he's hitting the ball like a dream and he's moving perfectly fine."
"Now, I know it's only practice points and its not the same as a match, its not best of five sets. So, he may still have a totally different view to what we have as onlookers, but if you were asking me to say if Novak Djokovic is playing Wimbledon or not, I'd be saying yes."
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