During an interview on the Best Tennis podcast, former world number 1 Yevgeny Kafelnikov harshly attacked Jannik Sinner, saying that the Italian is a tennis player stupidly designed to hit and that only Carlos Alcaraz can be placed on a par with the Big 3 Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer. And the former Russian tennis player ventured a comparison between the Italian ATP No.1 and two players of his time: the Swede Tomas Johansson and the Slovakian Dominic Hrbaty.
"Sinner is a serial hitter, a high-level player but he is one-dimensional, that is, he lacks the versatility of play that characterizes the great champions," he said.
For the winner of Roland Garros 1996 and Australian Open 1999, Sinner is stupidly designed to hit, a modernized and modified version of players like Hrbaty and Johansson. Let's remember that Hrbaty was at most number 12 in the world while Johansson, who won a Grand Slam event in Australia, in 2002, in the final over Marat Safin, and was at most number 7 in the world.
Kafelnikov instead praised Alcaraz, considered as the Big 3: I think that in terms of potential and talent Alcaraz is not inferior to Djokovic, Nadal and Federer. Sinner is another matter," he added.
The Russian former world number 1 also praised Djokovic: "He has a lot in his arsenal, he can play both attack and defense."
The young Italian is in these at the center of some criticism from former tennis players and tennis players, for various reasons, such as his words regarding The Six Kings Slam prize money or the intricate clostebol doping issue that sees him as an unwilling protagonist.
Trying to at least respond to the controversy surrounding the prize money of the Arab exhibition event, the young Italian explained during an interview with Eurosport: "I don't play for the money, it's very simple. Sure, $6 million is a lot of prize money, but I went to Riyadh because there were probably the six best players in the world and you can compete with them. It was also a nice event, it was my first time in Riyadh and it was very nice. When you come back as a winner for me it was more like saying: OK, I played the matches in the right way and I hope this can improve me as a player for the future. Of course money is important, but not that much. I live well even without money. What is much more important is my health, my family and the fact that I am surrounded by the right people. Money is just an extra."
