Jannik Sinner receives another chance to make pressure his friend

Athletes don’t escape pressure. They learn to live with it. More than that, they learn to gain strength from it.

Pressure can make an athlete shrink in fear, or it can make an athlete grow in intensity, focus, clarity, enjoyment. Pressure is not something to be removed. It can be reduced, but the most realistic approach to pressure for a world-class athlete is that it needs to be channeled into a positive force. It won’t be eliminated. It has to be embraced.

It’s time for Jannik Sinner to learn how to embrace pressure.

After Daniil Medvedev’s loss in the first round of Roland Garros, Sinner is the clear-cut favorite to make the semifinals from his quarter of the draw. What adds to the size of the opportunity in front of the Italian is that he’s in the half of the draw which is removed from Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic. Holger Rune and Casper Ruud are very good, high-quality tennis players, but they’re not yet in the class of Alcaraz or Djokovic.

Sinner found Medvedev to be a very difficult matchup — the Italian was 0-6 against Club Med — so a big obstacle has clearly been removed.

The highest remaining seed in Sinner’s quarter is No. 12 Frances Tiafoe. No. 15 Borna Coric and No. 22 Alexander Zverev are both capable players with Masters 1000 championships under their belts. However, neither player is in particularly good form right now. Sinner should expect to beat either man if an encounter emerges later this fortnight.

Making the final — and potentially getting past Rune or Ruud — would be momentous and important, but first things first: This is definitely Jannik Sinner’s quarter to lose. The Italian needs to make a first major semifinal not only so that he doesn’t have to answer questions from the press about that fact anymore, but also to set the table for Wimbledon and the second half of this 2023 season. If Sinner wants to set his sights higher, he first has to climb to a place he has never previously reached.

If he embraces pressure, Sinner will find out that the view from a greater height can be quite enjoyable to take in.