Taylor Fritz has stunningly claimed that Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner hit the ball harder during rallies than Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic.
Alcaraz and Sinner bring out the best in each other during their matches. Alcaraz won a thrilling battle at the China Open earlier this month before Sinner beat the Spaniard 6-7, 6-3, 6-3 to win the Six Kings Slam.
Other epic matches between the pair include five-set matches at the 2022 US Open and 2024 French Open won by Alcaraz and an entertaining four-set battle at Wimbledon in 2022 that went the way of Sinner.
Their entertaining contests make it tempting to compare them to Roger Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic, widely considered to be the three greatest players in tennis history. The three also shared incredible rivalries with each other.
Fritz has competed against Alcaraz, Sinner, Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic, giving him a unique insight into how each man plays and how difficult it is to overcome them in a best-of-3 or best-of-5 format.
The American fell to Sinner in the final of this year’s US Open. However, his struggles against Djokovic have been particularly acute. He has lost all ten of his matches against the Serbian, most recently at the Shanghai Masters.
Seven-time Grand Slam champion Mats Wilander caused controversy by claiming that Sinner and Alcaraz are producing better tennis than Federer, Nadal, or Djokovic did in their primes, but recent comments by Fritz might give what Wilander said more credibility.
Speaking on the Tennis Channel, Fritz said it feels like Alcaraz and Sinner are hitting the ball ten mph faster than Djokovic and Nadal, who were known for incredible and grueling rallies during their biggest matches.
“They just play these lateral baseline points. I don’t know what these crazy points you see Nadal and Federer – mostly you see Nadal and Novak have these long points corner to corner. But when Sinner and Alcaraz do it, I swear they’re doing the same rallies but hitting the ball 10 mph faster. It’s crazy.”
Although Fritz praised Sinner and Alcaraz’s defense, he also said neither of them has to defend very often because of how hard they hit the ball, especially when in the corners of the court.
“One thing both those guys do really well is just, their defense is incredible. Their defense is amazing but they don’t really play that much defense,” he said during his aforementioned appearance. Their defense is when they are full on the run out of the corners… they just crush the ball.”
The American used an example from his matches against the pair to illustrate how good Alcaraz and Sinner are. The 26-year-old stated that he has to hit his next shot perfectly after running around his backhand; otherwise, the next ball is getting drilled.
“A good example is, I can be in a backhand crosscourt rally with either one of them (and) if I get around one, pull forehand inside in or pull back in line, it’s gotta be so good or else the next ball is getting just drilled – huge crosscourt.”
