There are only so many times you can fire a ball at a wall before feeling the urge to bash your head against one. Against such truisms, Alexander Zverev succumbed to the familiar pain of an afternoon with Jannik Sinner, the champion of Wimbledon once again.
Across the course of three hours, 46 minutes and four sets, Zverev threw it all at the world No 1. He served missiles, he attacked with forehands that defied reason, and he even led for a while.
But walls are tough. Walls stand firm. Walls keep sending balls back. And so, with a splattering of genius and to a sense of the inevitable, Sinner flipped this final and won his fifth Slam title 6-7, 7-6, 6-3, 6-4.
He spared precious few frills or emotions along the way and even fewer break points – just one in fact. And, for the record, he saved it.
There were shades of Novak Djokovic in how he soaked up Zverev’s pressure in the first two sets and likewise in how he then turned the screw, slowly and in torturous little increments.
Was it spectacular? Not always, but bricks were never meant to be sexy. They are good for building, though, and by the age of 24 Sinner has already built something quite spectacular with his career.
Jannik Sinner has won the men’s singles at Wimbledon for a second consecutive year
The top seed and world No1 beat Alexander Zverev 6-7, 7-6, 6-3, 6-4 on Centre Court
‘It feels amazing,’ Sinner said after being reunited with the trophy he first won last year. ‘I want to start with Sascha (Zverev). Today you were so, so close I’m sure if you play like this you’ll have one of these (trophies at home as well).
‘I know another goal of yours is to become No 1 in the world, you are very close so we have to be very careful now!’
As he spoke, Centre Court responded in that way it does on these occasions – they clapped in the right places and fawned in others.
But is that the same love? Will success ever open that door for Sinner? Because he doesn’t play like Roger Federer. And he doesn’t emote like Rafa Nadal or Djokovic. Nor does he have the sheer pizzaz or creative impulses of Carlos Alcaraz, his great, absent contemporary.
No, Sinner doesn’t do those things – he kills you with his astonishing footspeed, with his sleights of hands that pivot defence to attack, with his quadruple-digit tennis IQ, and with his refusal to panic in high-stress moments, which is why he was able to dominate the second-set tiebreak in the face of going 2-0 down. Rise of the robots? With Sinner, it can feel that way.
But we also know there are other reasons for why Sinner is an awkward champion and they go to his brief ban last year for a failed drugs test.
We don’t need to relitigate that case in full here, but there would not have been a surprise if his suspension for doping – accepted quickly by the authorities as an accident – had stretched closer to the usual two years. That would have wiped out his 2025 title and this one, by the way, so fans can follow their own minds on what should be celebrated.
The same could also be applied to Zverev, of course. He has always denied the allegations of domestic abuse from two previous girlfriends, one of whom is the mother of his daughter, so there were no shortage of clouds on this summer’s day.
Zverev (right) thanked the crowd for their support as he joked he no longer likes his opponent
But Centre Court is rarely a place where tough questions get asked by the punters – they clapped both men on to the lawn, with Prince William, Princess Catherine and their children among the clappers of the Royal Box.
What followed was fascinating, mainly for the way in which Zverev attempted to shift the immovable object. His history with Sinner is startling for its one-sidedness, which had seen the Italian win each of their past nine matches in straight sets, and the German’s attempt at a solution was remarkably ballsy.
Perhaps that was the confidence borne from his breakthrough win at the French Open – or maybe it was the last remaining option of failing with all other approaches.
But he went for everything, especially on his forehand. He lashed at it, devil-may-care, and he was never going to die wondering. The scoreboard told us about a first set that stayed rigidly on serve, with only a single break point to Sinner and none for Zverev, but the latter’s courage in taking those risks should not be understated.
He was lower on winners than Sinner and higher on unforced errors – 15 compared Sinner’s five across those first 12 games – but he wouldn’t relent. He wouldn’t back down, and we haven’t always been able to say that about him in this of all duels. Often, his deference has been his enemy, but not this time, and not with 74 per cent of those 130mph-plus serves hitting their mark, and his reward came in the tiebreak.
Having survived setpoint at 6-7 with a 134mph ace, Zverev edged ahead and then fired a howling forehand winner for 9-7, claiming his first set in 15 attempts against Sinner.
With it, Zverev roared at his box and it was justified – his serving had been immense, so too the bravery of his approach.
But could it last? Would the wheels fall off?
The Princess of Wales was on hand to present the trophy aftrer watching the final from the Royal Box
Initially, the second set kept to an identical pattern of no breaks, no break points and, frankly, no abundance of fun. When Prince William and his boy George disappeared for a time, the easy assumption was that a shootout between servers had grown royally tiresome.
But the second tiebreak parted quickly from the pattern of the first, with Zverev ballooning a forehand long on the opening point and from there he unravelled quickly – 7-2. Into the third and suddenly there was a modicum more drama, with Zverev earning and failing to take his first break point at 3-3, before a mishit forehand gifted Sinner the next game against serve.
Closing the set 6-3, he appeared to have withstood the storm, and a forehand winner to break for 4-3 in the fourth ensured he had a hand on the trophy. Another on Championship point added the second hand and a second Wimbledon title.
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