Svrcina remembers 16-year-old Sinner: 'You could definitely see the potential'
In May 2018, 16-year-old Jannik Sinner was playing the final tournament of his junior career in Milan when he faced Czech Jonas Forejtek in the third round. In the crowd that day was another Czech player, Dalibor Svrcina.
“He was playing good, but you wouldn’t say he was something so special. You could definitely see the potential, but he was still young, skinny, and making some errors,” Svrcina told ATPTour.com. “It’s definitely amazing to see the progress of Carlos and Jannik, because I knew both of them in the juniors and they really were not ahead so much.
“So it’s really, really great to see and motivation that if you are improving and doing the right things, you can improve in your own way.”
Svrcina will challenge Sinner for the first time Friday in the second round of the first ATP Masters 1000 event of the year: the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells.
“He knows who I am. I know him, obviously, but we never practised,” Svrcina said. “We know each other from juniors a little bit. He didn’t play much juniors, but we saw each other. I’ve known him since he was maybe 15, 16, so we say hi to each other, but we never got to practise with each other.”
The 23-year-old will now stand across the net from the No. 2 player in the PIF ATP Rankings for the first time, having never previously clashed against a Top-10 opponent. Svrcina is well aware of the test he will face in the pair’s first Lexus ATP Head2Head showdown.
“I think he’s just so solid and playing so fast, taking the time away. He can do basically everything,” Svrcina said. “You can see that before, maybe one or two years ago, he didn’t have so much variation in shots, like maybe Carlos’ drop shots.
“But you can see he is trying to improve that. He is trying to play some drop shots. You can see that they are always working on something to improve. So, basically, I will see on Friday what’s so amazing about it, but let’s see. I am looking forward to it.”
The Czech has taken inspiration from watching Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz continue to reach new heights. Svrcina is currently finding a lot of joy in the knowledge that every day, he can find a way to improve.
“You can go to the gym, you can work on yourself, mentally, physically. This is the part of tennis that you don’t see much with the players because mostly you see how they practise, how they play matches,” Svrcina said. “But you don’t see the stuff they do at home or in everyday life. So I’m enjoying that a lot.”
[NO 1 CLUB]The World No. 109, who reached a career-high No. 86 in November, has recently begun playing bigger matches. Less than a year ago, he faced former World No. 1 Daniil Medvedev in Toronto before playing him again in Shanghai.
“Before that match in Toronto against Medvedev, I didn’t get to play a lot of matches like that against the top guys, and now I’ve played Medvedev twice,” Svrcina said. “I played Bublik. Now I’m going to play Sinner, so for me, it’s really, really good to gain these experiences.”
Svrcina traveled to the California desert from Acapulco with fitness coach Thiyagarajan Karunakaran. They flew from Acapulco to Tijuana, crossed the border from Mexico into the United States, and then, after spending one afternoon in San Diego, drove to Indian Wells.
The Ostrava-born righty likes spending time with friends in nature at home, particularly in the nearby mountains. So it is fitting that Svrcina marveled at the mountains during that drive and is preparing for the biggest match of his life with mountains in the backdrop of the Indian Wells Tennis Garden.
“I’m really liking it. The place is amazing,” Svrcina said. “The tournament is great, so I’m very happy to get through the qualifying and the first round. I’m very glad I’m playing well and to be able to play Jannik next round is amazing.”
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