Sinner, prevention is better than cure: the South Tyrolean tennis player learned his lesson and immediately put his hands out.
When, at the end of last summer, Jannik Sinner announced his willingness to take a few days off before returning to the court, he unwittingly stirred up a real ruckus. Because that stop would have prevented him from famously participating in the group stage of the Davis Cup.
In hindsight we know that his absence, fortunately, did not preclude Italtennis from getting its hands on the mythical salad bowl anyway. Still echoing everywhere, however, are the controversies that had followed that waiver. Nor was it the first time, truth be told, that the San Candido native was pilloried for his alleged disinterest in the Azzurri jersey and, more generally, in the Italian country. In July 2021, as the well-informed will undoubtedly recall, Sinner had been “guilty” of what was treated, at the time, as a horrible “sin.”
He had decided, that is, not to go to the Tokyo Olympics. For the same reason that prompted him, last summer, to skip the trip to Bologna with Coach Volandri and company, essentially. “It was not an easy decision to make but I decided not to participate in the Olympic Games,” he had communicated, “Representing my country is a privilege and an honor and I hope to be able to do it for many years. The decision was dictated by the fact that I have not played my best tennis during the last few tournaments and I need to focus on my growth. “
Sinner, lesson learned: never make the same mistake again
Three years have passed and we still seem to hear, absurd but true, the aftermath of the controversy that followed that decision. A script that has since been repeated but may never be repeated again, since Jannik has amply demonstrated that he has now learned his lesson.
“The Olympics is one of the most important events this year for some players. It is also for me,” the South Tyrolean said in recent days, “because this is the first time I am participating in the Olympics. I’m looking forward to it. I cannot talk about how it will go because it is the first time for me. We have to see how to manage the program as well because we will have a somewhat different schedule. Right after the Paris Games, for example, there is the Atp 1000 tournament in Canada. I already said last year that the Olympics will be a key moment for me, so it has priority. I’m looking forward to playing there as well.”
Only once you screw the old woman, goes a Calabrian proverb, and nothing could be truer. Now that he knows what he is up against, Sinner is unlikely to repeat the same mistake. That lesson, it seems, he has never forgotten.
