Sinner’s maturity too much for the flamboyant American
It was Day 7 at the Wimbledon Championships, with only 16 players each remaining in the men’s and women’s draw. And one of the awaited matches on Court-1 was between the world number 1 and top seed, Jannik Sinner and the talented young American southpaw, Ben Shelton.
‘Big Stage’ Shelton has electrified the crowds with his booming serve (one of the fastest on tour), fearless game style and his ability to rise to the occasion. He loves the big stages, and his confidence was at its peak, reaching round 4 for the first time at Wimbledon (emulating his father and coach Bryan Shelton, who reached Round 4 at Wimbledon 30 years ago in 1994) in his second appearance.
Coming out on top in three consecutive 5-setters in the first three rounds of the tournament, Shelton was beaming with confidence. However, having played 15 sets in 3 rounds, his fitness was expected to be a question mark. Also, no player in grand slam history has ever won 4 consecutive 5-set matches, though stretching Sinner to 5 sets would be a monumental task in itself.
Never met on grass
Coming into this match, the head-to-head was 2-1 in favour of Sinner, but none of those meetings were on grass. All three of their previous matches were played on hard courts within the last 10 months, with Sinner winning the most recent one in straight sets in the Round of 16 at Indian Wells in March 2024, 7-6 (4), 6-1. Shelton’s win came at the Shanghai Masters 1000 in October 2023 in the round of 16, ending 7-5 in a final set tiebreaker.
The match started off with both players serving big and backing that up with heavy forehands in the first couple of games. However, to Sinner, the tennis ball seemed to be of the size of a football. His timing on the serve returns was impeccable, getting most of Shelton’s serve bombs back into play. While Shelton was able to save a break point in his second service game at 1-1, Sinner ultimately got past Shelton’s serve when he got his second break point opportunity at 2-2.
Neutralizing Shelton’s biggest weapon, the serve, Sinner got another break point opportunity in Shelton’s next service game, converting again to take a 5-2 lead. Shelton making more unforced errors did not help either. Sinner followed it up with immaculate serving. At 5-2, he hit 4 first serves (3 unreturned) to hold to love and close out the first set 6-2. It was a clinical first set performance by the world number 1, who lost a single point on his serve in the entire set and made only 4 unforced errors compared to 10 coming from Shelton’s racket.
Sinner’s discipline and consistency was not providing any rhythm to Shelton in the match. Continuing to serve well, the Italian was not giving away any cheap points. While Shelton was expected to get more cheap points from that big serve, Sinner read that serve well. The Italian would be ready for Shelton’s dangerous high bouncing kick serve out-wide by reading Shelton’s ball toss which would be relatively far behind his shoulder.
Sinner broke Shelton again in the first game of the second set, consistently returning 130+ mph serves with depth, taking a 2-0 lead in no time. Shelton was rushed and was unable to fully adjust and settle into rallies. The American tried to come to the net a few times and was successful. Both players continued to hold serve in the next few games, with Sinner holding with much more ease. With Sinner finding 18/21 (86%) first serves, Shelton could not make any inroads into the Italian’s service games and the break in the first game of the set proved to be enough for Sinner to close out the set 6-4.
Match Statistics
The third set started off with Shelton striking the ball with much more discipline, being more patient in rallies. There was a visible shift in momentum, with Shelton able to go toe-to-toe in rallies against the world number 1 in this set. Aided by some uncharacteristic errors from Sinner in the second game of the set, Shelton made sure he waited for the right ball to hit, and finally earned his first break point of the match and went on to break Sinner’s serve and take a 2-0 lead in the third set. The American extended his lead to 4-1, finding his spots on serve and using the occasional drop shot after pushing Sinner outside the court with a booming wide first serve.
Sinner’s first serve % had dropped by then, however, he continued to come out on top in most of the longer rally exchanges. The 7th game of the set started off with Shelton committing a double fault. Sinner capitalized and put on a returning masterclass in the game to get the set back on serve. Nevertheless, Shelton returned well and earned a set point on Sinner’s serve at 5-6 (30-40). It was a second serve, and Shelton went for a difficult down-the-line forehand on the return, only to find the net!
Sinner giving nothing away
The set went into a tiebreak and Sinner was giving nothing away, finding his first serves which had deserted him during the set. A mini-break down at 5-3, Shelton’s discipline paid dividends, extracting two consecutive errors from Sinner in relatively longer exchanges. At 5-5, Shelton hit a beautiful down-the-line forehand winner to get to another set point at 6-5. However, he went all-out again and missed an inside-out forehand. At 6-6, on Sinner’s serve, the American pushed an easy backhand slice long. Then at 7-8, hitting two big serves, he had another set point at 9-8 on Sinner’s serve. He made the return and a nervy exchange ensued from Sinner’s backhand to Shelton’s forehand, with Shelton’s forehand eventually succumbing to squander his 4th and final set point.
From there on, Sinner maintained his composure to get to 10-9, finally winning the match on a Shelton double fault to close out the tiebreak at 11-9.
In the end, Sinner’s consistent groundstrokes, composure during key points, effective serve and his unbelievable ability to read Shelton’s big serve (both, the flat first serve and the bouncy kick second serve) proved to be too much for the flamboyant American’s relatively raw and volatile game. It was a validation of the Italian’s maturity as a tennis player and his rise to the top of the men’s rankings this year.
He is now 42-3 in terms of wins-losses in the 2024 season. This will be Sinner’s 3rd consecutive Wimbledon quarterfinal (losing in the SF in 2023 and QF in 2022, both times to Novak Djokovic) and he will face the winner of the match between Daniil Medvedev and Grigor Dimitrov.
