Can anyone stop the dominance of Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner?

Times

29-06-2025

The French Open final between Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner made it abundantly clear, if it wasn't already, that we are now living through a new era of men's tennis. They stand atop the sport not only as the protagonists in a blossoming rivalry, but also partners in a burgeoning duopoly.
Between them, they have now shared the past six grand-slam men's singles titles, and in that year and a half decisively separated themselves from the pack. The gap in ranking points between second and third is nearly as large as that between third and eighth.
At the French Open, Sinner didn't drop a set en route to the final, handling even Novak Djokovic with ease, and Alcaraz lost only one, to Lorenzo Musetti. The level they produced in that epic final was dizzyingly high. For a sport that was holding its breath as Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal rode into the sunset, wondering what would come next and if anything could ever compare, the Sinner-Alcaraz supremacy feels like a long-awaited answer. But it also raises a question.
Sinner, 23, and Alcaraz, 22, are strong favourites to meet in the Wimbledon final two weeks from now. Federer and Nadal in their pomp, between 2005 and 2007, once shared 11 consecutive grand-slam titles in a row. Right now, you wouldn't bet against Sinner and Alcaraz matching that streak. At the moment it's hard to imagine anyone beating them to one of the sport's major trophies. But sooner or later, someone will. Who? And when?
Let's start with the obvious name, not so much the elephant in the room as the GOAT. Djokovic, even at 38 years old, even having slipped to No6 in the rankings, even with his powers somewhat on the wane, is still the clear third-favourite for this Wimbledon and probably any other grand-slam tournament he cares to enter in the near future. He is still, of course, a formidable player, and it was only 11 months ago that he played quite masterfully in beating Alcaraz in the Olympic final.
And yet time is ticking. Djokovic is already two years older than Federer and Nadal were when they won their final major titles; indeed, he is a year older than any male grand-slam champion of the open era. There is no precedent for a man winning a major so deep into their fourth decade, and as the old saying has it, Father Time is undefeated. With every tournament that passes, Djokovic's already narrow window closes a little further.
Could he be the man to disrupt Sinner and Alcaraz's streak? Of course. But he's going to have to get on with it. In theory, Wimbledon should represent his best chance. The points are shorter on grass, so negotiating seven best-of-five-set matches ought to be less taxing. The two young hotshots are still relatively inexperienced on this surface — they have both played only 32 ATP Tour-level matches on it — and Sinner in particular seems to still be finding his grass legs.
Over the past ten years Djokovic's win percentage at Wimbledon is better than at any other grand-slam event: 92.8 per cent, compared with 92.4 per cent at the Australian Open, 89.8 per cent at Roland Garros, and 88.8 per cent at the US Open. Speaking on the eve of this year's tournament, Djokovic said he viewed Wimbledon as his best chance, 'because of the results I've had, because of how I feel, how I play at Wimbledon, just getting that extra push mentally and the motivation to perform the best tennis at the highest level'.
But if Djokovic doesn't win his 25th grand-slam title here — and he didn't take a set off Alcaraz in last year's final — his chance may have gone. Who would then be the likeliest candidate?
A Martian landing on Earth knowing nothing about tennis might well say: what about the world No3? And indeed, Alexander Zverev has to be in the conversation. He's an Olympic gold medallist and three-times grand-slam finalist. He's 28, so has plenty of years left in him, and at 6ft 6in the German certainly has the physical weapons. His record against Sinner and Alcaraz is actually pretty good: he has played each of them four times at majors, beating both men twice.
And yet, at the very biggest moments of his career, Zverev has seemed to be held back by his own frailties. In his latter two grand-slam finals, against Alcaraz at last year's French Open and Sinner at this year's Australian Open, the belief seemed to drain out of him at crucial moments. He lost his first final, against Dominic Thiem at the 2020 US Open, from two sets up. It takes a certain something to win a major — call it moxie, champion mentality, competitive edge — and until Zverev proves that he has it, the suspicion will linger that he does not.
Zverev is part of a generational wave of male players — those born in the 1990s — who have underperformed to an extraordinary degree. Between them, they have accounted for only two grand-slam titles, won by Thiem (now sadly retired) and Daniil Medvedev. And it wouldn't be a huge surprise if that number remained at two in perpetuity. Medvedev, 29, can still turn it on in the big arenas, as he showed in beating Sinner in last year's Wimbledon quarter-final, but he's not the force he once was. Likewise, Casper Ruud and Stefanos Tsitsipas feel like sometime contenders who are getting further away, not closer. Taylor Fritz and Tommy Paul are admirable players, but neither strikes you as a potential grand-slam winner.
So, what about the next wave: the early-Noughties kids, Sinner and Alcaraz's rough contemporaries? In the vanguard of this group of challengers, the rankings would suggest, are Britain's Jack Draper, Musetti, and the Dane Holger Rune. Draper's improvement over the past year or so has been remarkable, with his physical maturation exemplified by the fact that, having lost two of his first four meetings with Alcaraz by retirement, Draper came back to win a sapping three-set semi-final in Indian Wells in March this year. The 23-year-old has also won his only encounters with Sinner and Alcaraz on grass. Could he reprise the role Sir Andy Murray played during the 'big three' years: pertinacious gatecrasher of the picnic of the gods?
Musetti has a swoon-worthy and intermittently devastating one-handed backhand and is perhaps the third-best player on clay right now: the 23-year-old Italian was pushing Alcaraz hard in that Roland Garros semi-final before he got injured. Rune has plateaued a bit since beating five top-ten players to win the Paris Masters in 2022 as a 19-year-old, and hasn't reached the quarter-finals of any of the previous seven grand-slam tournaments. Any of these players could make a leap, but if they're standing across the net from Sinner or Alcaraz in their first major final (the big two have played four and five respectively), they will do so as a heavy underdog.
Ultimately, of course, Federer and Nadal's streak was interrupted by Djokovic: a younger man who emerged as the new kid on the block and turned out to be not just their interloper, but also their equal. Might someone come along to repeat that story? The most compelling auditionees for that part are probably Jakub Mensik, the 19-year-old Czech who is the youngest player in the top 50, or the meteorically rising 18-year-old João Fonseca, a Brazilian whose 'easy power' has had Andre Agassi awestruck (and whose untamed hair has a hint of early Murray about it).
Sinner and Alcaraz may look untouchable, but eventually someone will knock them off their perch: it could be a man born in the 1980s two weeks from now, it could be a kid born in the late 2000s in a few years' time. Right now, though, the ball is in their court, they're rallying back and forth among themselves, and if this point goes on for a while yet, uninterrupted, those of us watching won't complain.