Jannik Sinner will face Andrey Rublev on Monday at Roland Garros for a place in the quarter-finals in Paris.

Watching closely will be Italian coach Simone Vagnozzi, who has already had a major influence on the 20-year-old since they started working together in February. The former coach of Marco Cecchinato and Stefano Travaglia has quickly achieved strong results with Sinner, having overseen quarter-final runs at ATP Masters 1000 events in Miami, Monte Carlo and Rome.

Ahead of Sinner’s clash with Rublev, Vagnozzi spoke to ATPTour.com about how their partnership is going, Sinner’s competitive nature and more.

You recently started working with Jannik. How did the partnership come about and how are you finding the relationship so far?
We started the week before Dubai when Jannik ended his partnership with [Riccardo Piatti]. The agent called me and asked if I was free. I was free and I started and I think in these first three months the partnership is going well. We have had some small troubles physically, like the blisters in Miami and the injury in the first set in Rome against [Stefanos] Tsitsipas, but it was not big.

I am really happy with my feelings with Jannik and I am really happy to work with him because he is a really nice guy and always gives 100 per cent, so it is really easy to work with him.

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Is there anything specific you two have been working on since you joined forces?
We are working a lot on his serve. I think within the three months he has improved a lot. The speed of the first serve is improving and the speed of the second serve. How he changes the direction on the second serve is important as well.

We are also working on adding more variety — hitting drop shots and coming to the net more. He is trying to do everything and I am really happy with how he is trying to change in matches, it is not easy. From these changes, I am happy with the results he has had. He has had a good clay season, so I am happy with the progress.

Jannik will play Andrey Rublev in the fourth round at Roland Garros. What have you made of his run in Paris so far?
The first round we had a really good match against Bjorn Fratangelo. The second round was really tough against [Roberto] Carballes Baena, who is a fighter. They played in the evening and the court was slower, so it was not easy to close the points and we were happy to get through. Against [Mackenzie] McDonald we were really happy, because he had a problem with his knee, but this kind of thing can happen during two weeks at a Grand Slam.

It was really good to win the match with this injury and today on Sunday he is already better in training. He will be 100 per cent to play against Rublev. They played in Monte Carlo, it was a fight, a three-set win. I am sure it will be another tough match.

Jannik has saved match points and gone on to win in four matches so far in 2022. How impressed are you with his mental strength on court?
He is a fighter. He never wants to lose a point in tennis and then off the court he never wants to lose at cards! He likes the tough situations and the pressure points. He is not scared to play pressure points, so for a coach it is much easier to work with someone who has this mentality.

Jannik has already broken the Top 10 and enjoyed so much success. What are your aims going forward together?
We didn’t plan any ranking or winning tournament goals. We are just focused on improving his game. This is the goal for this year: to improve his fitness, his running. We are working to be ready in one year or two years to win consistently. He can have amazing results now, but we have to work on his technique, tactics and body more. The goal now is to improve his steel. 

Last year you weren’t working with Jannik but he had a good year. What were your thoughts on him from the outside?
I saw him play a lot. He beat my ex-player [Stefano] Travaglia. I worked with Travaglia in 2021. Jannik beat him in the final in Melbourne [at an ATP 250]. From the outside, I thought he was a really talented guy and had an unbelievable mentality, so I was not surprised with his results. I know he is one of the best young guys on the Tour, so we just have to work and focus to improve.

What do you like to do together when you are away from tennis?
We like to watch soccer. We watched the Champions League final. We ordered room service and watched the final. For soccer, I am an Inter [Milan] fan and he is an [AC] Milan fan, so there is a little rivalry. We also play cards and we love food in Italy, so we like to go to dinner. Jannik is a really good chef. He makes really good pasta with tomato sauce.

You Coached Marco Cecchinato and Stefano Travaglia in recent years, achieving success with both. How have the experiences you’ve had helped you as a coach today?
The experience helped me. I had three years with Marco and three years with Stefano. All the experience I have gained is good. Some I can use with Jannik, some not. I am still young, so I have to work a lot to reach the best coaches. The best coach gets the best from the player, so that is my goal.

After spending four hours and 21 minutes on court with Rafael Nadal on Sunday at Roland Garros, Felix Auger-Aliassime knows where the Spaniard’s game stands. Although Nadal is a 13-time major winner for whom he has the utmost respect, the Canadian believes the road will only get harder for the lefty after their five-set thriller.

Will Nadal be able to defeat World No. 1 Novak Djokovic on Tuesday in their quarter-final blockbuster?

“I wish Rafa the very best, I admire him greatly in everything that he’s done. He’s somebody who I really like, and so I wish him the very best for the next match,” Auger-Aliassime said. “But then I think that he also knows that it’s going to be difficult. We played for a long time today and it’s still the quarter-finals and afterwards there’s still two more matches to win to win the tournament. Rafa is coming here to win the tournament.

“So as I said, I really wish him the very best, but it will be a monumental effort for him, I think, to win. But as he and Novak have always done, they will give it their all right through to the end and it will be a great battle.”

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It will not just be a massive challenge for Nadal, but for Djokovic as well. Auger-Aliassime experienced the difficulty of playing Nadal himself on Sunday, when he played top-tier tennis only to fall short against the fifth seed.

“[It takes] a lot of effort, a lot of concentration. At one point even though he raised the level of his game, there were a few dips, physically, mentally, and I kind of lost the order of the game. I lost my intentions at one point,” Auger-Aliassime said. “But despite everything, I managed to come back when necessary, to serve well again.

“At the end of the day, I showed some positive things, and I managed to last the whole run and it’s positive for what comes next.”

Despite his loss, Auger-Aliassime has now advanced to at least the fourth round at four consecutive majors. Before this streak, he had not made it that far at two straight Grand Slams.

Furthermore, Nadal has only lost three of his 112 matches at Roland Garros, with two of those defeats coming against Djokovic. Auger-Aliassime became just the third player to push the lefty to a fifth set on the Parisian clay, joining Djokovic and John Isner.

“I’m proud about the effort I produced, the game I played, and like most of my matches I try to leave the match without any regrets,” Auger-Aliassime said. “I tried things, I changed my tactics, my position and I think I tried everything with regard to what I did today.

“I think my service is very good, but there are things in my game that I can improve to be more comfortable in certain moments or maybe win not just by the skin of my teeth, you have to have a comfortable win. So there are things that I can improve, but I’m proud and I have no regrets.”

Instead, Auger-Aliassime will try to move forward taking lessons he learned from the match and his entire stay at the clay-court major. He is No. 9 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings and is trying to push higher.

“It’s always, I think, a constant work of progress trying to be a better player all the time. I know I have great shots, but they can be always more, more precise, more powerful, and more consistent,” Auger-Aliassime said. “So that’s like the main line. That’s the work of every day. But it’s good to spend time in these matches on these courts and battle four hours, test yourself mentally, physically, and at the end, that’s how you learn.

“You just try to put yourself in these difficult situations and try to find a way.”

Entering the tournament, Auger-Aliassime had not won a main draw match at Roland Garros. The Canadian leaves Paris having won three and tested an all-time great.

“It does me good to prove it to myself and to others that I deserve my place in the last players of a tournament like this one and I hope that in the coming years I will have the opportunity to win,” Auger-Aliassime said. “It makes me very happy to have won a few matches here this year.”

Carlos Alcaraz has broken new ground all season, and he did so again on Sunday in Paris.

The Spaniard reached his first Roland Garros quarter-final with a 6-1, 6-4, 6-4 win against 21st seed Karen Khachanov. The sixth seed will next play third seed Alexander Zverev for a place in his first major semi-final.

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Alcaraz saved a match point in the fourth set of his thrilling second-round five-setter against countryman Albert Ramos-Vinolas. Since that moment, he has shown the form that made him one of the leading favourites at the clay-court major.

In the third and fourth rounds, Alcaraz has won all six of his sets — against Sebastian Korda and Khachanov — by a margin of 6-4 or greater. The 19-year-old lost serve just once against Khachanov to advance after two hours and 14 minutes.

The story of the match could be told by one sensational point at 3-3 in the third set. Khachanov hit a smart, dipping forehand passing shot and then snuck a lob over his teen opponent’s head with his next shot. But Alcaraz had the answer, hitting a stunning tweener lob over Khachanov’s head to break serve.

The 21st seed battled hard throughout to make inroads against Alcaraz, but the sixth seed always seemed to have the answer.

^{Photo Credit: Ryan Pierse/Getty Images}
Khachanov made 35 unforced errors, which did not help his cause. But part of that was because Alcaraz forced him to go for more with his own play. Khachanov is one of the biggest hitters on the ATP Tour, but his power, depth and spin did not seem to bother the Spaniard.

Alcaraz hit 37 winners compared to just 19 for the 26-year-old. Khachanov broke for the first and final time in the third set, but the Spaniard got it right back with his stunning tweener.

Alcaraz needed six match points to complete his win, but he finished the job when Khachanov was unable to put a backhand passing shot in play. The 19-year-old will now turn his attention to Zverev, whom he defeated just weeks ago in the Mutua Madrid Open final.

Zverev leads the pair’s ATP Head2Head series 2-1, but Alcaraz has significantly improved since his two losses against the German last year. At the Caja Magica, he lost just four games against Zverev to lift the trophy.

Rafael Nadal was happy to battle through a tough five-set challenge on Sunday against Felix Auger-Aliassime at Roland Garros, but the Spaniard knows it will only get tougher.

Next up for the 13-time champion will be World No. 1 Novak Djokovic, who has handed the lefty two of his three losses at the clay-court major.

“I didn’t play these kind of matches for the past three months, so [it is] going to be a big challenge for me. Of course he already won I think [his] past nine matches in a row, winning in Rome and now winning here in straight sets every match. Probably he will be confident,” Nadal said. “I know how my situation is and I accept it well. I’m going to fight for it.”

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It is easy to forget that Nadal missed a month-and-a-half after the BNP Paribas Open due to a stress fracture in one of his ribs. Then after a quarter-final showing at the Mutua Madrid Open, the Spaniard lost in the third round at the Internazionali BNL d’Italia while visibly struggling due to his long-term foot injury.

For those reasons, Nadal said he “can’t complain much”.

“I am in [the] quarter-finals of Roland Garros. Two weeks and a half ago, even if I had good hopes, positive hopes after Rome, I [didn’t even] know if I would be able to be here,” Nadal said. “So just enjoying the fact that I am here for one more year. And being honest, every match that I play here, I don’t know if [it is] going to be my last match here in Roland Garros in my tennis career. That’s my situation now.”

Nadal explained that it was a “tough process” dealing with his reoccurring foot injury. In recent weeks he has explained that the injury is something that will not go away.

“That’s why I am just trying to enjoy as much as possible and fight as much as I can to keep living the dream that is [to] keep playing tennis and be back in a very advanced round of Roland Garros, playing against the World No. 1,” Nadal said. “Let’s see. I hope to be able to give myself a chance to play at the highest level possible.”

Nadal is now a jaw-dropping 109-3 at Roland Garros, where he will face Djokovic for the 10th time and 59th time overall. Although Djokovic leads their ATP Head2Head series 30-28, Nadal has claimed seven of their nine meetings on the Parisian terre battue.

The Spaniard is well aware that taking out Djokovic, who has not lost a set through four matches, will be difficult. But he is not going to do anything different than usual ahead of this matchup. Instead, the lefty’s process will be simple.

“Have some stretching, my physio. Then eat something probably,” Nadal said, cracking a smile. “Have some sleep. Have a good practice tomorrow and rest tomorrow afternoon. That’s it. Nothing special.”

Wesley Koolhof and Neal Skupski continued to bring their best form to the Roland Garros clay on Sunday when they cruised past all-American duo Mackenzie McDonald and Tommy Paul in the third round.

The Dutch-British pairing struck 32 winners to McDonald and Paul’s 12 in a 6-3, 6-2 victory as they charged to their second Grand Slam quarter-final of the year. Koolhof and Skupski, who currently lead the Pepperstone ATP Doubles Team Rankings after picking up four titles in 2022, have dropped just one set in Paris so far.

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The sixth seeds face a tough test in the last eight, however, where fourth seeds Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos await. The Spanish-Argentine team beat Jonny O’Mara and Jackson Withrow 6-1, 6-1 to advance to the quarter-finals at Roland Garros for the first time in three attempts.

Marcelo Arevalo and Jean-Julien Rojer came good in the deciding set to prevail in their third-round meeting with seventh seeds Tim Puetz and Michael Venus. Arevalo and Rojer ran out 6-4, 2-6, 6-1 winners to advance to their maiden Grand Slam quarter-final together. The 12th-seeded Dutch-El Salvadorian pairing is chasing a third tour-level title of the year in Paris.

Arevalo and Rojer will next face Rafael Matos and David Vega Hernandez after they overcame Sander Gille and Joran Vliegen, 6-4, 3-6, 7-6(6). Matos and Vega Hernandez are making their Grand Slam debut as a team at Roland Garros, and they held their nerve to clinch a deciding set tie-break against their Belgian opponents. The Brazilian-Spanish pair has already enjoyed success on clay this year, lifting a maiden tour-level trophy in Marrakech in April.