Even as Carlos Alcaraz has a chance to become the first man in the Open Era to win a US Open without losing a set, his opponent Jannik Sinner has identified one major change in his arsenal – the serve.
“He has improved the serve a lot,” Sinner said after his semi-final game. “I feel like he is serving much better with a better pace but the percentage is high all the time. It’s much more solid.Maybe before there were more ups and downs, but now he is very consistent. If you watch all the tournaments, he is going very far.”
Alcaraz has lost just 58 games in 18 sets in this tournament thus far, and needed just two tie-breaks. The improvement in his serve has been a talking point this year; his coaching team has been trying to make the serve motion a lot smoother to give him more control, rather than power. His backhand too has been tweaked – on the faster courts, there seems to be a conscious effort to take it earlier and bring the racket face down from a higher level to flatten it.
Obviously none of it has escaped Sinner. “So there are many, many improvements. But I always say that when you are young, one or two years can make a big difference. I feel the same with me. The serving has gotten better, my net game has improved, it’s not there yet where I would love it to be. But we are working on it, and also the movement, the physical shape is better than back in the day. I was maybe struggling a little bit if we go three or four sets, but now I feel fine.”
Sinner’s coach Simone Vagnozzi says he expects Alcaraz to come with different plans than what was done during the Wimbledon final.
“It will be a very difficult match. Carlos will try to do something different than in the Wimbledon final, so we need to prepare. It will be important to work on some tactical details. Then we need to go out and play, enjoy it, and push without pressure,” Vagnozzi told supertennis.tv.
Vagnozzi also spoke about how Sinner too is adapting tactically much better these days. “Before, he only played on himself, now he’s able to work on his opponent’s weak points too. The ball goes very fast, it’s difficult to change much, but we’re always looking for some solution: tonight, for example, more high-flying balls on Auger-Aliassime’s backhand, trying to open up the angle more .”
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Sinner has dropped two sets enroute to the final, and one instance was in the semi-final game against Felix Auger-Aliassime. He had also taken a medical time-out during the match and the coach Vagnozzi explained what happened.
“He just had a little abdominal discomfort at one point, but after treatment with the physiotherapist, it went away. When he came back, he wasn’t sure how he was doing in the first few games, so he didn’t push; then he started pushing and his serve got better and better. I think he’ll be fine for Sunday,” Vagnozzi said.
“Sometimes you’re tired and you don’t want to show it to your opponent. In the second set, his energy dropped a bit: if your opponent senses it, he can take advantage. You have to know how to mask emotions and physical situations a bit.”
The coach also identified a mistake from Sinner during the game – playing the ball too much to the middle of the court. “During the match, we recommended a few more kicks to start the rally with an advantage. Then the abdominal discomfort complicated the situation; he felt more pain when throwing the ball back. Perhaps at a certain point he played too much center and Aliassime was able to swing his forehand. It’s not easy to change heights against someone who serves and pushes so hard,” the coach told Supertennis.
