Jannik Sinner is in the quarterfinals. © APA / HARRY HOW
Three players over 30, three wins: Jannik Sinner also defeated Stan Wawrinka on Tuesday evening in Indian Wells (local time) and for the first time bought the quarter-finals ticket of the Masters 1000 tournament in California.
March 15, 2023
From: leo
First Richard Gasquet, then Adrian Mannarino, now Stan Wawrinka: Three old masters wanted to prove in Indian Wells that they can beat the young Sextner in the autumn of their careers. They didn’t succeed, although they let their class shine through. The three-time Grand Slam winner Wawrinka also had his moments of glory, but had to admit defeat following 1.38 hours 1: 6, 4: 6. In the quarterfinals on Thursday there will be a duel with the world number 5. TaylorFritz. The American leads 1-0 in a direct comparison. His only victory was in Indian Wells, of all places, two years ago.
Sinner met Wawrinka for the fifth time. That’s not the only reason why he knew the game of the Swiss inside out. The two “hard hitters” often train together in Monte Carlo, and they’ve also shared the court in Indian Wells. So there were no secrets, and there was no usual scanning.
Fulminanter Start
Sinner and Wawrinka showed a horrendous pace in the first three games. The 37-year-old seemed to be able to follow this without any problems and worked out three breakballs. After Darren Cahill’s protégé fended them off, Wawrinka had already shot his powder. Sinner, on the other hand, played his power tennis in an inimitable manner and broke the Swiss’ resistance. Two breaks meant the 6:1 set win.
Stan Wawrinka fought sacrificially. © APA / HARRY HOW
Sinner served much worse that evening than in the previous games and was therefore faced with many breakballs. Wawrinka used the sixth chance to start the second set and ran away to 2-0. Visibly unimpressed, Sinner promptly regained the lost service game because he was the significantly better, more solid player in the rallies.
Wawrinka also showed that he had spent almost three hours on the pitch once morest Holger Rune the day before. The last step was missing, so the number of errors increased accordingly. Sinner used this to break once more following a game that lasted almost ten minutes. With a lot of effort, he then defended his lead to the finish.
