Before Sunday, Carlos Alcaraz had already set up the curriculum vitae at the start of the most impressive career in the history of tennis. It was 4-0 in the major final. He became the youngest man to reach the world no. 1 In 2022, when he won the US Open with three consecutive victories in five sets. He upset the defending champion of four times Novak Djokovic in Wimbledon in 2023 with a fifth set performance in which he levied above the central court. And he did all this before he was 22 years old.
It is easy to become hyperbolic about the stars that shine so early, but Alcaraz experienced media threw that started international when he upset Stefanos Tsisipas in the third round of the US 2021 open. When you look at Alcaraz, you never discuss what he can’t TO DO. Because there is nothing neckline – it is able to hit a shot from any position on the ground. However, there was one thing that he did not have Again Done before the final of the Sunday open against Jannik Sinner: come back from two sets in a Grand Chelm match. It is difficult to withdraw the ultimate return against anyone. Doing it in a major final against someone with relentless coherence, rhythm and depth of the sinner, is like trying to climb Mont Everest by strong winds with your legs tied together.
The final of the French Open of Sunday was a marathon that doubled as a sprint, while Alcaraz and Sinner tried to hit almost all the balls as hard as possible, that they stood inside the basic line or slipped into the corners. They fought against the thinnest fatigue, nerves and margins. Alcaraz saved his best tennis for the 10-point equality break at the end of the fifth set and won the match 4-6, 6-7, 6-4, 7-6, 7-6. At 3-5 in the third set, he saved three championship points on his own service, then broke the service of Sinner when the Italian had the championship on his racket. Sunday’s victory will be one that will define the inheritance we discuss years after Alcaraz has called this a career. His perseverance, his creativity and his incredible van are what makes this French open open raised Against the sinner his most beautiful hour. Or, its best hours and 29 minutes, to be exact.
The young Spaniard spent most of his young career as a usurper. Like the elected official since he broke out in 2021, he was supposed to be the only heir to the three large on sport. He combines the passion of his compatriot Rafael Nadal with the defensive skills of Djokovic and the artistic shooting of Roger Federer. He plays with a huge smile and a unpredictability This electrifies crowds around the world. When Alcaraz for the first time upset Djokovic in Wimbledon in 2023, this was to be the beginning of the Alcaraz era in male tennis. But that’s not quite what happened. It didn’t take long before Alcaraz had a good rival and a challenger who was not old enough to be his father.
Sinner, a 23 -year -old man raised on Alps ski slopes before fully kissing tennis, has the power and stability of the basic line that has made him a deserving world. 1. He has been the most regularly 3 -year elite player on tour, (1) a tennis machine that won 47 consecutive matches against unnamed players Alcaraz dating back last August. In the Open de France 2025, he reached the final without dropping a set or seeming to sweat.
But even throughout the rise of the sinner at the top, Alcaraz kept the AS in the hole: the advantage of head to head. In this same section since last August, Alcaraz beat the sinner three times that they played. He entered Sunday with four consecutive victories against his rival and a record of 7-4 in total. Its speed mixes with its creative genius to overwhelm the sinner in the points of the best consumption. Of course, the Spaniard could lose an open match in the United States to the Dutch companion Botic Van de Zandschulp or an Australian open quarter-final to a hindered Djokovic, but his ability to play his biggest and best tennis in the most important moments is essentially unknown in a sport that even causes the best in the fight. The Alcaraz camp worked with him to play more percentage fire and improve his match coherence in match by perfecting his assault. But taking it too far from the genius of the hunting tower. All this is part of the package. It’s like looking at Maximus in the Gladiator ring; You are there to entertain yourself, and you will never be disappointed to watch Alcaraz.
Sinner is the only player on the tour who can match and sometimes even better the movement and the Alcaraz current for the shot. But the intoxicating athletics of Alcaraz and the dazzling van have already beaten the sinner. This is how he saved match points against sin 2h50 in Queens. And how he came back from Down 2-1 to beat Sinner in the French Open semi-finals last year. The two best players in the world have a lot of history, but Sunday was their first final face to face. The long -awaited match seemed predetermined before a single ball was touched in Paris, and it even exceeded our wildest expectations.
Alcaraz joined two sets on Sunday to win his second consecutive France open. Once again, he retained the challenge of the man who tries to dethrone him from the top of the male tennis pyramid. Alcaraz did not always play his best throughout the five -hour Sunday match, but he never resigned. He can always count on his legs for the defense. And he has a strange ability to save his best tennis for the exact moment when his back is the most in a hurry against the wall.
In theory, you could trust the more reliable sinner to produce a better end -of -match tennis than Alcaraz, which is subject to more inconsistency. The sinner is a tennis robot scheduled with legal blows and losses and, above all, an improved capacity to cover the courtyard and finish with quality flights with the net. It is no longer just a basic basher, but a versatile talent. This is the kind of player you could come back to beat the innovative Alcaraz, who will try shots that seem impossible … until they are not. You don’t think Spanish can happen to this ball on the race … until his pass shooting lands on the line and you have lost the point. Instead of simply defending and locking, Alcaraz launches the pressure dial at the zenith.
The presence of Alcaraz and Sinner at the top of the sport is not only the start of the next great rivalry of tennis. The two men have combined for the last six titles of the Grand Chelem – Sinner won the last three in short harsh, and Alcaraz won the three on natural surfaces. It is also an suffocation of the generation that preceded them. The sinner and Alcaraz erased the sun and took all the oxygen for themselves.
The players of this previous group – Alexander Zverev, Daniil Medvedev, Casper Ruud, Stefanos Tsisipas, Dominic Thiem, Andrey Rublev and others – said to come in the ranks they just had to wait for the three big ones to get their turn to glory. But now that Federer and Nadal are retired and that Djokovic has suggested that he was approaching his end, this generation has been fully transmitted. By focusing on the players in front of them, they did not realize that the players in the rear view mirror were closer than they seemed.
If I was a little older professional during the male tour while looking at the Alcaraz balls and Sinner Bash against each other with a remarkable rhythm for more than five hours on Sunday, I would plan to hang the racket. It would be discouraging to realize that these two guys are both considerably younger and better than you. What are you supposed to do now? The door of a breakthrough seems closed while these two guys are at this level.
This is one thing when there is a superhuman dynamo at the top of sport. But now there are undoubtedly two. It is not as if the sinner had “stifled” the final of Sunday. There is no doubt that he would like this second service to return to the 15-40 championship point in the fourth set. He should have absolutely had to serve the title better. But the only major criticism of Sinner’s game was that he did not have endurance to maintain his level in long games. It is true that he has only 6-10 in five sets in his career, but physicity and endurance were not the reasons why the sinner lost his fourth set advance. In fact, the sinner showed incredible physical form and resilience when he broke Alcaraz serving the match in the fifth set. The sinner arrived at two points again after winning the open in the fifth set. Alcaraz has just raised his game to another level.
One of the beautiful things about uniformly paired rivalries is that they force the two parties to continue to increase their levels to correspond to their competitor. Think of the Warriors dynastic against the riders led by LeBron James. Peyton Manning and Tom Brady’s record constant establishment in AFC. Or how the bills tried to ingest a defense specifically to slow down Patrick Mahomes (ok, maybe not the best example). Federer, Djokovic and Nadal would not have become as large as they did if it was not for their rivals constantly testing the limits of tennis. Alcaraz did just enough to remember Sinner this time, on the surface where he has the greatest perceived advantage. While the place moves to the London Grass or the Hard Short Queens for the last two Grand Chelem of the year, the bar was fixed. This emerging rivalry is as entertaining and dramatic as any sporting event on the calendar. We were all witnesses when Alcaraz kissed the role of hunting and once again surprised us.
Anthony Dabbundo
Anthony Dabbundo is a sports betting editor and podcast host presented on the Ringer game show, mainly focusing on NFL and football (he is a supporter of the tortured Spurs). In addition, he is a big fan of phillies and can be heard of baseball on the special ringtone. Also: go orange.