Luck Runs Out: Prepare & Thrive

Yesterday was a day that Jannik Sinner he will hardly forget. The blue scored the pass for the team round of 16 of the Australian Open at the end of a very tough match against Eliot Spizzirribeaten in a comeback 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 after almost four hours of play. A complicated match from the start, with a dull first set, an immediate reaction and then the physical difficulties that emerged in the third set, when the cramps limited his mobility. The closure of the roof due to the heat (as required by the specific protocol of the Australian Open) allowed him to partially recover, but what made the difference was above all the character with which Sinner managed the key moments against an opponent far more insidious than the ranking suggests.

At the end of the match, the South Tyrolean analyzed the victory with great clarity, recognizing that not having played his best tennis and also benefiting from the circumstanceswithout losing sight of the objective and the need to recover in view of the next meetings.

The theme of “fortuna” however, he returned with force in press conferencethrough a clearly provocative question from a foreign colleague: “You said you were lucky. You also said it last year here in Melbourne, when the net broke while you were in trouble against Holger Rune. Are you afraid that sooner or later your luck might run out?“.

Sinner’s response was measured, profound and not at all defensive, worthy of a mature champion: “I don’t know this. However, I know how much I work and how long I have been giving top priority to tennis. I feel well prepared, even though problems can always arise on the pitch. There are days when you can’t find solutions and everything doesn’t go your way. But with a positive mindset more good things can happen. However, if you think negatively, it is easier for other negative things to happen. I try to stay calm even in moments like this: if he had continued to play like this and I had dropped further, my tournament could have ended today. That’s how it went and I think that’s where it ended“.

Words that shift the focus from episodes to the path, from chance to responsibility, and which tell much more than a simple victory: they tell the awareness of those who know that nothing happens by chance, especially at the highest levels.