Brad Gilbert Calls Jannik Sinner Perfect Combination of Novak Djokovic and Andre Agassi

Jannik Sinner‘s next task is to complete the Sunshine Doubles. After two unsuccessful campaigns, in Melbourne and Doha, the Italian ace finally lifted his first title of the season by battling past Daniil Medvedev in straight sets in the Indian Wells final.

And with this win, Sinner became the first man in the history of Masters 1000s to lift two consecutive trophies at this level without dropping a set. Novak Djokovic also signed up for the event but failed to move past the fourth round with a three-set defeat to defending champion Jack Draper.

Recently on The Big T podcast, Andre Agassi and Coco Gauff‘s former coach, Brad Gilbert, said Sinner’s tennis resembles two tennis greats.

If you put Andre and Djokovic in the blender, you come up with Sinner. He kind of plays to their style, a modern version of what Djokovic did and what Andre did with ball control offence.

Sinner often gets the label of Djokovic 2.0 because of their similarities in playstyle. Former WTA ace Coco Vandeweghe, who was also a part of the podcast, is convinced that players from the future generation will be much better than the current one, dominated by Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz.

You get players like Jannik Sinner and Andre Agassi, and Novak Djokovic and you think what could be the next generation? What is that generation going to look like! That’s scary!

Coco Vandeweghe said

Djokovic was the reason behind Sinner’s failed title defense at the Australian Open. Jakub Mensik knocked him out in the quarterfinals of the Qatar Open.

In the Miami Open finals, Sinner lost to Hubert Hurkacz in 2021 and to Medvedev in 2023. He won the title in 2024 by defeating Grigor Dimitrov, but didn’t play last year due to his doping ban.

Martina Navratilova explains why Alexander Zverev keeps losing to Jannik Sinner

Before defeating Medvedev, Sinner breezed past Alexander Zverev in the semifinals of Indian Wells, which helped improve his head-to-head record to 7-4. It was, in fact, the World No.2’s sixth consecutive victory over Zverev.

Why does the four-time Grand Slam champion have such an upper hand over someone like Zverev? Tennis great Martina Navratilova attributed it to Sascha’s lack of variety.

He’s done so well moving to the net, and his technique is just perfect. Darren Cahill has really improved his volley and transitioned to the net. Zverev’s just too far behind the baseline, he didn’t have enough to bother Sinner… I think Zverev doesn’t have enough variety; he doesn’t have enough of a backhand slice to bring Sinner inside the court, so he’s only running side-to-side, he doesn’t have soft hands to pull him off the court, and Sinner can do that all day long, and eventually gets on top of a point, and eventually it’s all over.

Martina Navratilova said on Sky Sports

They met four times last year, and except for the Vienna Open final, all matches ended in straight sets, including at the Australian Open. The World No.4 played four finals last year, winning just the Munich Open by defeating Ben Shelton. He has yet to win a title since that win.

Because of Sinner’s Indian Wells triumph, he is now 2,150 points behind Alcaraz on the rankings table. The World No.1 has 13,550 points while his arch-rival has 11,400 points.

Sinner gained 1000 points in the first Masters 1000 of the season because he had no points to defend, and he won’t defend any points at the Miami Open either. Alcaraz will also not be defending many points in Miami, given that he suffered an opening-round exit last year.

Also read: Daniil Medvedev Draws the Ultimate Comparison Between Jannik Sinner, Carlos Alcaraz and the Big 3

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