Jannik Sinner gave Darren Cahill a man hug in the VIP seats in Rod Laver Arena. His Australian coach is an honourable bloke and didn’t want to steal Sinner’s time or thunder. He slapped the young Italian stallion’s back and said, “Go and enjoy yourself, mate.”
Sinner skipped over to the presentation ceremony. As honourable as his venerable mentor, he spent most of it consoling Alex Zverev, glaring at the sorrowful German from point-blank range, placing his forehead on Zverev’s like they shared a Maori hongi while telling him to keep on keeping on. Sinner won his second straight Australian Open, and third major in five starts, in a commanding, never-in-doubt 6-3 7-6 (7/4) 6-3 triumph that left Zverev on a duck “You can do this, too,” Sinner told him.
We knew who would win on Sunday night, and he won. The atmosphere was elegant rather than electrifying. Appreciative more than anything too ballistic or bonkers. Sinner and Cahill were the epitome of gracious, noble victors. The supercoach is revered globally in tennis but under-appreciated in Australia because he lives in Las Vegas and most of his accomplishments have been offshore with overseas players. If ever a coach deserves to enter the International Tennis Hall of Fame, let alone the Sport Australia Hall of Fame – what’s the delay there? – it’s the coach nicknamed “Killer”.
He’s guided Lleyton Hewitt, Andre Agassi, Ana Ivanovic, Andy Murray, Simona Halep and Sinner to major wins and the World No. 1 ranking. To do it with one player is a feather in one’s baseball cap. To be so wildly successful with six athletes is the whole fedora. The 59-year-old South Australian plans to hang up his clipboard and retire at the end of the year.
“It’s going to be very difficult,” the honourable Sinner said of life without the honourable Cahill. “He’s a very honest, honest person. To be a good coach with so many different players, you have to understand the player and you have to get into the rhythm of the player. What he likes, what he doesn’t like. It takes him just some weeks to get into that, and then he’s there.”
Cahill is a leading analyst with American broadcaster ESPN. He’ll likely continue with his media work at the majors. Meaning he can still be in Sinner’s ear at the tournaments that matter. “One thing I really love about him is he’s very, very humble,” Sinner says. “He suits into the team very, very good. I tried to make a good result for him here because being Australian, it’s his last grand slam here … coaching is important on court but mostly also off the court. I got very lucky to find Darren. We try to keep working, keep believing, and that’s it.”
Sinner’s somewhat broken English has two favourite phrases. “That’s it,” and, “No?” He’ll state a fact then dare you to disagree. The sun is yellow, no? His unflappable demeanour at Melbourne Park came despite the thunderhead cloud of doping saga surrounding the two-time Open champion. The Court of Arbitration for Sport will convene in Switzerland on April 16-17 to deliver the final verdict on Sinner’s two positive tests for performance-enhancing substances. It’s a worry, no?
He claims his innocence, your honour. Swears the minute amounts of clostebol in his system were caused by a careless physiotherapist having cream on his hands during a massage that contained the banned anabolic steroid. Here’s the rub. Nobody in tennis, apart from Nick Kyrgios, seriously believes Sinner is a drug cheat. But a positive test is a positive test and CAS normally takes a dim view of these things. That’s it.
When Australian Open boss Craig Tiley was introducing Sinner, who probably needed no introduction, to the world’s media at 1am on Monday, he said: “You’re an absolute pleasure to have around. What people don’t see perhaps behind the scenes – your character and the way you treat people is very honourable.”
Cahill had told Sinner to “walk tall” at Melbourne Park. Sinner honoured and obeyed him. Cahill said nobody was “bulletproof” but he believed Sinner was in a strong mindset because of his adamance of innocence.
“It’s actually tough to describe,” Sinner said of handling the doping controversy. “When I go on the court, even if sometimes it’s very difficult to block these kinds of things, I have the team and people who are close to me, who trust me. That for me is even more important because I can talk very openly with them. That’s it. When I go on court, I try to focus on the match. I know the match can be three, four, five hours. Of course, it’s still a little bit in the back of your mind. I know that I’m in this position now. Nothing I can change.”
Sinner and Cahill. Men of honour, no? I find it impossible to believe they fiendishly hatched a plan to put a steroid in Sinner’s system so small it made no difference anyway. It’s shocking to think WADA might succeed in having Sinner banned for two years.
More immediately, at the very least, the best player in the world might not be around for the French Open in May.
Asked if a possible/probable ban provided extra motivation at Melbourne Park, Sinner replied: “Not really. I mean, what happened happened, no? As I always say, I keep playing like this because I have a clear mind on what happened. If I know if I would be guilty, I would not play like this. And that’s it. I still believe every time it came out in a very positive way, and I still believe it’s going to be that case. That’s it, no?”
Well, no, no? A positive test is a positive test …
“At the moment I’m not thinking about this,” Sinner said. “Of course, you have your moments of certain days where you feel like, ‘I wish I would not have this problem.’ In the other way, I’m always looking forward to going on court, trying to understand. Now I also need my time off, which is also very important for my body and my mind. Then when I go again back on court, I try to improve again.”
Sinner added: “Honestly, having these difficulties, especially in the tough moments and how I handled them, I know exactly this will help me in the future. I want to enjoy this one because this one has a different feeling, has a different perspective, this trophy. “I just came off an amazing run again here and I want to enjoy this moment, to be honest. Then it’s the (CAS) hearing. We know now the dates and that’s it. I want to enjoy this one now. It’s difficult to talk about the future but this win means so much to me. The year is still long.”
Not necessarily. April 17 could be the end of it, no? CAS’s decision in Lausanne must be honoured. That’s it.
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