“Something is still missing,” Nikolay Davydenko believes Jannik Sinner hasn’t reached the point fully to challenge Novak Djokovic

The Italian will return to action at the 2024 Australian Open where he is one of the favorites to win the title.

“Something is still missing,” Nikolay Davydenko believes Jannik Sinner hasn’t reached the point fully to challenge Novak Djokovic

Jannik Sinner (L), Novak Djokovic (R) (Sources: Open Source/X)

Former Russian tennis player Nikolay Davydenko recently commented on Jannik Sinner, who has been in wonderful form lately. He might have started the season at a slow pace but the Italian ruled the latter half of the 2023 tour and has proved his mettle to the world.

The World No. 4 is predicted to shine even more in the upcoming year as well. However, despite praising the youngster, Nikolay Davydenko believes that Sinner has not yet fully reached the point where he can challenge Novak Djokovic. 

Djokovic and Sinner played some pretty intense matches throughout the 2023 season. In fact, in their group stage match at the 2023 ATP Finals, Sinner beat the Serb for the first time in his career. He opined that every time he faces the Serb, it allows him to find out whether he has made any improvements in his performance. Unfortunately, he could not repeat his success against Djokovic and lost the final of the ATP Finals against him. 

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If he only pushes through the fight, it means that something is still missing. It’s difficult to get through the entire season on willpower alone. You can catch some tournaments, great matches or TBS, but in order to go through the whole season like Djokovic, you need to be able to do something else. Maybe it's psychology.
Davydenko said. (H/T: Championat)

Davydenko feels that although Jannik Sinner is a great player and has improved a lot, it takes much more than that to challenge Djokovic. The Serb is a 24-time Grand Slam winner for a reason and Sinner needs to improve a lot until he can even get to the point where he can pose a threat to Djokovic.

Nikolay Davydenko calls Jannik Sinner a hard-worker

Despite saying that Jannik Sinner is not at the level of Novak Djokovic yet, Nikolay Davydenko agreed that he is a hard worker and is trying to change the game. Although Sinner, according to him, does not demolish everyone easily, he plays with character and pushes till the end. 

Jannik Sinner
Jannik Sinner (Source: Tennis365)
I saw it live how Sinner plays and trains. He's such a hard worker. He is trying to change the game: he skates, moves well, is physically strong, tall, serves - everything is well-established and stable for him. 

He concluded by saying that if Sinner continues to play like this, he will definitely improve his results. The Italian will return to action at the 2024 Australian Open where he is one of the favorites to win the title after his recent performances. 

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