![\"Yevgeny](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/kafelnikov-nitto-atp-finals-2025-no-1-club.jpg\")
<\/p>\n No 1 Club
\n Kafelnikov on Alcaraz-Sinner rivalry: ‘It’s like yin & yang’<\/p>\n
Former World No. 1 is visiting Turin for the Nitto ATP Finals<\/p>\n
November 12, 2025<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Andrew Eichenholz\/ATP Tour<\/p>\n
Yevgeny Kafelnikov is one of 29 players who have reached No. 1 in the PIF ATP Rankings.
\n By ATP Staff<\/p>\n
Yevgeny Kafelnikov<\/a>, one of only 29 members of the prestigious ATP No. 1 Club, is thrilled with the development of the rivalry between Carlos Alcaraz<\/a> and Jannik Sinner<\/a>, who are battling this week at the Nitto ATP Finals<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cFantastic for tennis. It would be not great if only one would be dominating because the charisma of both, they kind of match each other. It\u2019s like yin and yang,\u201d Kafelnikov said in Turin. \u201cOne is one style, the other one is completely different and that\u2019s what fans like. No question. You see it here in Turin, Jannik is selling the stadium as well as Carlos. They\u2019re both great for tennis, absolutely.\u201d<\/p>\n This is the former No. 1 player in the PIF ATP Rankings\u2019 first visit to Inalpi Arena and he has been impressed by what he has seen, both on site and from afar.<\/p>\n \u201cThe fact that Italians are playing, that always makes it special. One thing I wish [is that] we could have had the tournament in Moscow in 2000 when me and Marat [Safin] were both Top-10 players. We could also sell the stadiums left and right,\u201d Kafelnikov said. \u201cTurin is great and I think the whole idea is to host the tournaments where tennis is a very popular sport and I\u2019m sure in Italy now with all the Italian players doing well, tennis on the rise in the country, I think there is no better place to be honest I would find to host the event.\u201d<\/p>\n Kafelnikov has plenty of experience at the Nitto ATP Finals<\/a>, having competed in the tournament seven times. He played six fellow No. 1 Club members at the season finale: Pete Sampras<\/a>, Andre Agassi<\/a>, Boris Becker<\/a>, Gustavo Kuerten<\/a>, Carlos Moya<\/a> and Juan Carlos Ferrero<\/a>. <\/p>\n \u201cI think the fact that you get rewarded for all the hard work, which you\u2019ve done through the calendar year. That\u2019s a perfect ending,\u201d Kafelnikov said. \u201cYou win the tournaments, you play well in the Slams and you get rewarded, the best eight players competing with each other.\u201d<\/p>\n You May Also Like: Alcaraz eyes Federer, Sampras & co’s footsteps in bid for Nitto ATP Finals glory<\/a><\/p>\n One player \u2014 Sampras \u2014 proved his nemesis at the Nitto ATP Finals<\/a>. They met four times at the event, with the American emerging victorious on each occasion.<\/p>\n \u201cI enjoyed every bit of being in the tournament starting from back in \u201895 in Frankfurt. It was a fantastic arena. Then the next four years were in Hanover, also great. The only negative was that I always ran into Pete Sampras<\/a> in every single tournament starting from the group and even to the \u201897 final,\u201d Kafelnikov said. \u201cHe was always on me. I never got over him, unfortunately. But I enjoyed it. <\/p>\n \u201cLisbon was a fantastic event in 2000 and of course another successful tournament for me was the very last tournament I played in, it was in Sydney 2001. I love the tournament every bit.\u201d<\/p>\n Visit The ATP No. 1 Club Hub<\/a><\/p>\n Kafelnikov closely follows the ATP Tour throughout the season, including in the leadup to the Nitto ATP Finals<\/a>. The 26-time tour-level singles titlist watched Joao Fonseca<\/a> last month earn the biggest title of his career at the ATP 500 in Basel and believes he could one day be competing at the year-end championships.<\/p>\n \u201cFonseca obviously with all the things he\u2019s done this year and winning the big tournaments like for example Basel just recently a couple of months ago, he could definitely be the one that we should look at next year,\u201d Kafelnikov said. \u201cIf he continues to do what he does, I\u2019m sure if not next year, then the year after he will be here.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"No 1 Club Kafelnikov on Alcaraz-Sinner rivalry: ‘It’s like yin & yang’ Former World No. 1 is visiting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":279017,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":{"0":"post-279016","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279016","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=279016"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/279016\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/279017"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=279016"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=279016"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=279016"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}