Jannik Sinner: Victor Hanescu Delivers Harsh Criticism

Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz aren’t cut from the same cloth as Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, and Novak Djokovic: so says Victor Hanescu, a former Romanian tennis player who lived through the era of the Big Three, which he considers far superior to the current one.

“The main difference between the two eras is consistency. From a certain perspective, I understand Jannik and Carlos, because despite their young age, they’ve already won several major tournaments. Perhaps they don’t have the same goals; maybe they don’t have the same ambition to win as much as the Big Three did,” Hanescu said, as reported by Ubitennis.

According to the former world No. 26, Sinner and Alcaraz “are happy just to be on the court and play good tennis, and that seems to be enough for them.” Hanescu praised Novak Djokovic, who is still competing at age 39: “He impresses me because he manages to maintain a very high level of tennis. Right now, I think it’s unlikely he’ll be able to win another Grand Slam.”

Returning to the comparison between the two different eras, Hanescu explains why the era of the Big Three was much more competitive: “I think what was truly impressive was their consistency. Today, in the later stages of the Grand Slams, we have several young players taking turns against each other. My impression of that era is that it was simply impossible to reach the semifinals of a Grand Slam. Because the spots that mattered were always taken by those three and by Andy Murray, who often managed to break into the mix. Facing them was an extreme experience.”