{"id":661422,"date":"2026-05-24T00:56:17","date_gmt":"2026-05-24T00:56:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/661422\/"},"modified":"2026-05-24T00:56:17","modified_gmt":"2026-05-24T00:56:17","slug":"french-open-2026-will-the-paris-mens-draw-be-a-one-horse-race-or-can-somebody-stop-jannik-sinner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/661422\/","title":{"rendered":"French Open 2026: Will the Paris men&#8217;s draw be a one-horse race &#8211; or can somebody stop Jannik Sinner?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">At this stage it is difficult to see anybody beating Sinner at Roland Garros.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sinner has only lost to one man other than Alcaraz at the majors since Wimbledon in 2024 &#8211; that was Djokovic in this year&#8217;s Australian Open semi-finals.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The 24-time major champion rolled back the years, showing how he still has the nous and heart to beat anybody. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">But, having turned 39 on Saturday, does he still have the physical capability to go all the way on clay? <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The fact that Djokovic remains the most plausible challenger to Sinner is a damning indictment on the rest of the men&#8217;s tour.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Many of the players expected to challenge Sinner are floundering, with a glance at the leading French Open seeds offering little suggestion that he can be defeated.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">German second seed Alexander Zverev generally looks beaten by Sinner before he steps onto the court, as demonstrated by a limp 6-1 6-2 defeat in a Madrid final which proved to be a non-contest.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Canadian fourth seed Felix Auger-Aliassime has fallen well short of his best this year, while American pair Ben Shelton and Taylor Fritz &#8211; seeded fifth and seventh &#8211; have been hampered by injury.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Sixth seed Medvedev recently showing the best form is ironic, seeing as he has never been shy to show his disdain for the clay &#8211; and started the European swing <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/tennis\/articles\/cp9v7p34223o\" class=\"ssrcss-18834jl-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">with a 6-0 6-0 defeat in Monte Carlo.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;I always say sports is sports. So [Sinner] can lose,&#8221; said Medvedev, who famously pronounced the red dirt is &#8220;for dogs&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Every round someone is going to be on the other side of the court trying his best to beat him.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At this stage it is difficult to see anybody beating Sinner at Roland Garros. Sinner has only lost&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":661423,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":["post-661422","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661422","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=661422"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/661422\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/661423"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=661422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=661422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=661422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}