Wimbledon: Sinner beats Struff to reach the semi-finals

It used to be his weakest shot – certainly not a decisive one. Today, it was the shot that secured his place in the Wimbledon semi-finals: it was his serve that saw Sinner, on Court 1, prevail against 36-year-old Jan-Lennard Struff in the quarter-finals (16 aces in total). It finished 7-5, 7-6, 6-3. It was a match with few rallies, a battle of first serves – the German, with his height, is no pushover – which determined the course of the first two sets. In the first set, the deadlock was broken at 5-all when Sinner managed to respond effectively by breaking serve with a thunderous forehand. The second set was more eventful, with a break (by Sinner) and a counter-break early on, along with other wasted opportunities, leading to a tie-break. And here, as he always does, Jannik raised the bar, stunning his opponent and immediately taking a 5–2 lead. Of the two set points (6–4 in his favour), the first was enough. In the third set, Struff, ranked 74th, was losing momentum, whilst Jannik played with greater composure. Overall, it was a solid match, though not a particularly entertaining one, with the Italian still some way off the performances that have had fans dreaming.

What matters is that I’ve reached my third Wimbledon semi-final, my second in a row (my tenth in a Grand Slam). “I need to raise my game. I’m playing quite well; I’m getting a bit better every day; today was a tough match; he started very well, putting me under pressure, but then I found my rhythm. There’s room for improvement: I know it’s necessary for the next match, but I’m fairly relaxed. I enjoy playing in the big matches,” he said at the press conference. He now faces the winner of the Djokovic v Auger-Aliassime match. Should it be Nole (as is most likely), it would be an opportunity to heal the wound from last year’s Australian Open semi-final: that defeat to the veteran denied him the chance of a hat-trick in Melbourne. We’ll see. Certainly, as he recounted at the press conference, he hasn’t forgotten the first time he saw the Serbian champion, ten years ago: “I was 14, wearing a blue tracksuit top and with long hair. He was training in Monte Carlo and that’s where I played against him for the first time: I was happy just to be on court.”

Meanwhile, tomorrow here at Wimbledon, the quarter-finals featuring Jasmine Paolini (against Marta Kostjuk) and Flavio Cobolli (against Arthur Fery) will take place on Centre Court, starting at 14:30 Italian time.