“It comes to a point where you wonder if tennis can be played any better” – Ruud on Sinner’s stratospheric performance
Jannik Sinner thrashed Ruud both at practice and in the semi-finals of the ATP Finals. In a very insightful press conference, the Norwegian reflected on how special and innovative the Italian’s tennis is. In this piece, we let Ruud’s own words do all the talking
Casper Ruud and Jannik Sinner, ATP Finals 2024 | © Chryslène Caillaud
“Jannik Sinner is playing extremely well from every corner of his game, if I can say that. Serving well, returning well. Every kind of groundstroke feels like rockets are thrown at you. That’s tough.
“I found that he was playing great offensive and also great defensively. Felt like he was moving better than sometimes you might expect from him because he’s a quite tall guy. He’s strong because he plays long matches and has no problem. When you look at him, he doesn’t necessarily look like a body builder, you know? But I think he also knows himself.
“He’s really fast on the court. He can get too many balls… I felt like even some points I was throwing him from side to side, he was defending and sliding around really well. I was really impressed with everything from his game.
“Unfortunately, I didn’t serve good enough. I don’t think necessarily would be the key to have any real chance of beating him. But the serve was missing. If you don’t make many first serves against him, it’s going to be even tougher.
“When you have this feeling on court, it is normal you get a bit stressed and you maybe overplay a bit, go for too much. That was the case tonight. I hadn’t played him in three years. Everything in his game improved. He stepped up with every aspect, or even from last year, end of last year. It’s really fun to watch.
It’s normal that I feel a bit, ‘Whoa, what should I do here?’
“I admire Jannik a lot as a player. As a person, he’s very serious about what he does. It’s inspiring. Even though he’s younger than me, I have a lot to learn from him.
“During the first 15 minutes of the match Jannik was not making one error, we had some really good points, and all of them went his favour. It’s normal that I feel a bit, ‘Whoa, what should I do here?’ If he plays winners from backhand and forehand, you have to applaud and say ‘too good’ sometimes. This has been the case in many matches I watched Jannik. He’s playing almost too good for most of the opponents. Yeah, it’s really impressive. He goes for his shots fully committed.
“It’s something I definitely can learn, as well. Sometimes I’m maybe hesitating a bit. Especially on this surface, I don’t necessarily dare to go as aggressive as what he does. I learned tennis for 20 years and I didn’t learn tennis going for winner on the first or second shot. My mentality, how I grew up playing a lot on clay in Spain, it was a different way of playing tennis.
For a split of a second, every time before you hit a shot you know, ‘If I don’t get this right, I might be punished on the next shot’
“It’s more kind of sometimes a bit of a waiting game, more patient tennis. I feel that might punish you against someone like Jannik. This year I won over 50 matches and I lost 20 or something. All in all it’s a good way of playing tennis. Against someone like Jannik, it’s something missing, I definitely felt it today and something I will know next time I play him.
“You feel like unless un court unless you hit a ball with really good depth or close to the sidelines, and even if you hit close to the sidelines but not fast enough, he’s going to rip it back at you. You know that keeping depth and a heavy ball is really important. As soon as you don’t necessarily hit your spots, he’s going to be there and try to punish you. And most of the times it works well.
“Of course, he does also unforced errors like every other player, just not that many. He hits beautiful shots. So, it’s stressful. For a split of a second, every time before you hit a shot you know, ‘If I don’t get this right, I might be punished on the next shot.’
With Novak Djokovic, you can play rallies.
“I don’t think you can compare that with Djokovic’s game. They play different tennis. On TV it looks probably similar but Jannik hits a faster ball than Novak. He doesn’t let you breathe. With Novak, you can play rallies. Not going to say it’s easier to play Novak because he’s the best in the history. But at least with Novak you can play rallies and not be terrified of Novak ripping, like, a bomb down the line or cross-court or these things.
“I don’t necessarily like to compare players because everyone has their own style. For me, you don’t realize how fast Jannik plays unless you watch him play live and you’re there in the stadium. On the TV, the speed is not fair.
“I got to practice with him here earlier leading up to the tournament. He also kicked my ass there. In a way, I knew what I was facing today. Sometimes you feel like players might play even better in practice because they play with no pressure and such things. But today he played really well from the beginning until the end.
Every time he needs to step up, he’s able to do it.
“Even the points I played really well, he was there defending well. I ended up doing a stupid mistake at the end. It comes to a point where you wonder if tennis can be played any better than certain levels you can see in a match. Of course, you can say that you can hit every shot on the line, but that’s not going to be possible in the end to do time and time over.
“Jannik has stepped up, I think he’s done it all week, when he had to. Every time he needs to step up, he’s able to do it. I am just really impressed with how he’s kept his level high for every week and every tournament this year. I mean, he lost only six matches. It’s quite interesting, because three of them is against Alcaraz, and three others are with Tsitsipas, Medvedev and Rublev, only Top 10 players. I hope he calms down for next year.
“I’m always trying to improve. In my eyes, it’s too late to kind of change what kind of player I am at this point. I’m 25. The structure of my game is already there. I’m not going to start playing super flat or different style of tennis now. I need to be able to flatten out the shots a bit more and also be able to kind of – I don’t know how to explain it – but from defence, especially on hard court, be able to take a bit more risk. It’s definitely a goal for me to be able to flatten out the shots more, as I know the majority of the season is played on hard court.
“I’m not going to say I would have won against Jannik if it was my day. But I hope I can play Jannik more in the future because it’s a really fun challenge even though today I lost badly. I think I learned that I need to serve better next time I play him. Also try not to stress. I mean, It’s also mental because it’s stressful. Hopefully it’s not three years until the next time (smiling). I will have a fresher memory of what it’s like to play him.”
