{"id":438872,"date":"2026-01-26T16:43:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-26T16:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/438872\/"},"modified":"2026-01-26T16:43:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T16:43:09","slug":"jannik-sinner-defeats-fellow-italian-luciano-darderi-in-straight-sets-post-match-interview-video","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/438872\/","title":{"rendered":"Jannik Sinner defeats fellow Italian Luciano Darderi in straight sets, post-match interview, video"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jannik Sinner<\/a> admitted he felt “very, very tight” against fellow Italian star Luciano Darderi<\/a> on Monday night in a sign the scorching Melbourne heat is starting to take a toll.<\/p>\n

The two-time Australian Open<\/a> champion advanced to the quarter finals in straight sets, defeating his countryman 6-1, 6-3, 7-6(2) on Margaret Court Arena.<\/p>\n

Sinner raced ahead early on against Darderi, who was clearly feeling the effects of playing against one of the world’s best players on a big stage.<\/p>\n

READ MORE: USA star ‘frustrated’ after ‘clickbait’ question causes stir<\/a><\/p>\n

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The world No.25 was lucky to avoid a code violation when he smashed his racquet and then launched a ball into the crowd in frustration early in the second set.<\/p>\n

“He needs to be careful here,” Colin Fleming said in commentary for Nine.<\/p>\n

Darderi managed to regain his composure in the third set and pushed Sinner to his limits, forcing a tiebreak before getting outclassed when it mattered most.<\/p>\n

Watch the Australian Open live & free on the 9Network & 9Now<\/a>. Stan Sport<\/a> is the only place to watch every match, live & on demand with centre court in 4K.<\/p>\n

Speaking post-match, Sinner admitted it was tricky to navigate playing against a close mate in a grand slam, but he was glad to get the job done in straight-sets with plenty of major matches left on the horizon at Melbourne Park.<\/p>\n

“It was very difficult – we are good friends off the court,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It felt like in the third set, I had a couple of break chances and couldn’t use them. I got very, very tight, so I’m glad that I closed it in three sets.<\/p>\n

“I tried to raise my level, I started off very well in the match and also how I closed with some important pressure points.”<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Jannik Sinner defeated Luciano Darderi in straight sets.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Sinner finished with 19 aces, breaking his previous career-best of 17 that he set on Friday in a clinical win over Eliot Spizzirri.<\/p>\n

Asked by courtside interviewer Ryan Harrison if it was a conscious effort to finish points quickly, Sinner recognised that the work behind the scenes was paying off. <\/p>\n

“I wish it would be that easy,” he said with a smile.<\/p>\n

“We put a lot of work in, especially with the serve. I feel a little bit more confident and I feel like there’s still room to improve, which is normal.”<\/p>\n

Sinner will face the winner of Ben Shelton and Casper Ruud in the quarter finals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Jannik Sinner admitted he felt “very, very tight” against fellow Italian star Luciano Darderi on Monday night in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":438873,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":["post-438872","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438872","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=438872"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/438872\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/438873"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=438872"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=438872"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=438872"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}