Sinner, joy and tremors

His face turns pale, his hands tremble. His head ends up in the folds of the towel while Jannik seems to fall into the nightmare of a malaise halfway through the game. In Australia bad memories of Wimbledon resurface, and of one of the very few matches lost by Sinner in 2024, in the quarterfinals against Daniil Medvedev. But then they disappear in eleven minutes. That's enough for the Italian - who takes a long break in the locker room - to get back in control of the match against Rune and beat the Dane in four sets (6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2) while, a few courts further on, Lorenzo Sonego also made Italy jump on their seats, reaching his first Slam quarter-finals (beating Tien 6-3, 6-2, 3-6, 6-1).

But these are moments of great concern when Sinner begins to feel nauseated and short of breath, in the middle of the third set. In addition, there is that trembling in his hands while he lifts the water bottle: something already seen a few months ago in Djokovic's changeovers. Signs that - according to experts - could also be traced back to strong states of anxiety.

They are above all signs of a day that started badly and continued worse, with the number one on his legs and a match to close out against the recovered Dane. A difficult match therefore, with a hitter with no qualms to contain: "I didn't feel very well today, no injuries but a feeling of general malaise - said Jannik -. I had slept a lot last night, and if I hadn't set the alarm I would have continued to do so; but when I woke up I didn't feel well. I don't want to go into the details of what happened". The Italian says he went to the doctor before playing, that he changed his usual pre-match routine precisely because he wasn't feeling well: "I tried to put all my energy into this match - he explains -, I tried to manage and overcome the difficulties. Luckily I succeeded". A sign that something disturbed the game of the number one in the world, who was also able to take advantage of a twenty-minute stoppage when the net hook collapsed after his serve: "It helped me".

The incident is shrouded in mystery. Because at Wimbledon there was talk of a virus, in Australia the blame is on the heat and a possible "drop in blood pressure" later recovered thanks to "a little cold water on the head" in the medical timeout, as the world number one himself says. A break with added spice post-match by Rune. The Dane also gets treated towards the end and then in the press conference he says: "It's right that he got checked, but I think it took longer than it should have at a time when I had momentum (it happened with Sinner 2-1 in the third set). Then he came back and was fine, so I don't know what they did to him".

The fact is that from there the Azzurri's game took off again: the objective was achieved quarter finals, reached the tenth place at Slam level for the fifteenth time in a row (only the big 3 had managed it, until yesterday), tied with Pietrangeli. In the sights - in the quarterfinals - now there is an old acquaintance, Alex De Minaur, sacrificial lamb par excellence against Jannik. The host has never beaten the 23-year-old from Alto Adige in 9 direct clashes: only in 2024 has he been knocked out three times. The fact is that Sinner's path from the early rounds to the final is always that of the favorite with the lowest odds. The only unknown, the only doubt: the champion's physique. The hope is that yesterday's was a temporary failure in the torrid Australian afternoon.

And the blue of the Melbourne courts makes us dream of an all-Italian semifinal. Yesterday Lorenzo Sonego signed the 'quarterfinals' feat after 26 Slam attempts. The next challenge, again on Wednesday, is Ben Shelton: "I will try to avenge Lorenzo (Musetti, ed.) eliminated by the left-handed American". Should he and Jannik advance to the next round, there is the prospect of a home derby that is worth an invaluable page of history for Italian tennis.