The 19-year-old Jodar looked to be his most intriguing test of the week as the young Spaniard stormed into his first Masters 1000 quarterfinal fresh off a maiden ATP title victory in Marrakech earlier this month. As a wild card, Jodar scored back-to-back upsets over No. 5 seed Alex de Minaur and No. 27 seed Joao Fonseca—defeating the latter in a late-night thriller that indirectly led to Sinner playing an 11 a.m. fourth-round on Tuesday—and, as a result, is projected to be in range for a Roland Garros seed.
“Jodar is a very, very clean hitter, very easy power,” Sinner said over the weekend. “You can hear with the sound, you know, when he touches it, and it’s a good sound coming from the racquet. He’s very, very talented. He’s going to be a great, great player in the future, and he’s already showing. I like the mentality, it’s quite calm. I don’t know him personally, but he seems very humble.”
Still, Sinner was clearly the stronger of the two as their quarterfinal clash began on the top seed’s terms. Sinner claimed two breaks to nab the opening set and had Jodar on the ropes in a tense ninth game of the second.
Jodar, who had five break points of his own on Sinner in the second set, gamely held and the set hurdled towards a tiebreaker. Claiming the first mini-break, Sinner continued a run of 10 straight points to take a 6-0 lead in the Sudden Death, serving out the win in just under two hours.
Sinner will await the winner of the quarterfinal match between No. 21 seed Arthur Fils (Sinner leads 1-0) and No. 11 seed Jiri Lehecka (Sinner leads 4-0).
