'He got exactly what he needed to get out of this week': Gil Gross reviews Jannik Sinner's performance in Rome Open final loss

Despite the straight-sets scoreline, Jannik Sinner's run to the final of the 2025 Rome Open offers a wealth of insight. Tennis analyst, Gil Gross, offered a detailed review into the world's No. 1 performance, ensuring that the Italian surpassed all expectations coming out of the 90-day suspension.

Veteran tennis analyst Gil Gross explored the key moments that defined Sinner's week in Rome, dissecting each technical and tactical nuance, and explaining in detail, what's should be the Australian Open champion focus to improve for the second major of the season, Roland Garros.

“Sinner got exactly what he needed to get out of this week. Came in with low expectations in weird circumstances, not knowing exactly where he was. Turns out where he was level-wise was actually really good.

"He beat Francisco Cerúndolo and Casper Ruud in mightily impressive fashion, two players who I consider to be top-10 players on this surface, and he got some extra data on Carlos Alcaraz in terms of learning about what he might need to do better next time.”

Reviewing the match, Gross pointed out some interesting insights regarding a crucial point, when the Spaniard served 5-6 and gave Sinner his only two break chances:

"They end up playing 12 points… It was 15-40. Alcaraz hit a serve out wide and Sinner missed the return. But then at deuce number one, Sinner misses a neutral forehand… Deuce number two, he goes inside-out and misses it just wide—an unforced error off a ball you would really expect him to hit a forehand winner off."

Those miscues, rare in his arsenal, swung momentum and cleared the path to the tie-break.

Sinner failed to handle Alcaraz serve the entire match, as he couldn' really connect his rival's serve: he was mainly standing up in the court… hitting attackable returns and then out of position defensively off the baseline. He had no chance to defend against Alcaraz’s plus-one."