WORLD number one Jannik Sinner made a return from a potential hip-injury and a premature Montreal exit to post a second round win in Cincinnati overnight. After a bye in the first round, Sinner was able to overcome young American Alex Michelsen in a tough two-set contest, 6-4 7-5.

On his home nation court, Michelsen gave the top ranked talent a scare, creating eight break point opportunities across the two sets, but Sinner was good enough to put them away and remain unbroken. By contrast, Sinner broke twice from five chances and was able to win 56 per cent of his return second serve points.

The Italian was a little shaky on serve upon his return, winning 74 and 61 per cent of his first and second serve points, but only ran at a 51 per cent clip. He still served nine aces to get himself out of trouble a few times, but also four double faults. The Next Gen hope who had to come through qualifying to make the main draw, competed hard for an hour and 52 minutes on Center Court.

“It was a tough match. He played already some matches but for me it was the first match here, so I tried to feel the conditions a but more,” he said post-match. “I’m very happy to be in the next round. For me this is a place where I used to struggle a lot in the past years, so let’s see what I can do this time.

“I’m trying to stay in a positive mindset, positive moment, and I think that today also brought me the win.”

Sinner moved to an incredible 25-2 record on hardcourts in 2024, and will take on Australian Jordan Thompson in the Round of 16 after he saw off the threat of Argentinian Sebastian Baez. Sinner is a win away from completing a rare untouched feat of his, reaching the Cincinnati quarter finals.

The Italian admitted her was “not 100 per cent” just yet physically, but was beginning to adapt to the new conditions on the American hardcourts having lost in the Montreal quarter finals to eventual finalist Andrey Rublev after withdrawing from the Paris Olympics.

AROUND THE COURTS

In the other United States-Italy battle, it was the homecourt hero in Frances Tiafoe continuing his great run on home soil with a 6-3 6-2 victory over Olympic bronze medallist, Lorenzo Musetti. There was more heartache for the home nation across the course of the day though, with both DC Open champion Sebastian Korda, and qualifier Aleksandar Kovacevic dismissed in straight sets against Spaniard Pablo Carreno Busta and Canadian Felix Auger-Aliassime respectively.

Coming off an incredible five Top 20 wins in Montreal, champion Alexei Popyrin ran out of gas in the first round, losing to Frenchman Gael Monfils. There was better news for Aussie wildcard Max Purcell, who defeated Czech Tomas Machac.

A couple of top seeds struggled to get past talented big-serving opponents, with Stefanos Tsitsipas and Holger Rune both coming back from a set down to defeat German Jan-Lennard Struff and Italian wildcard Matteo Berrettini in three sets.

Other winners on the day were Portugese qualifier Nuno Borges, Brit Jack Draper and Argentinian Tomas Etcheverry who all took over two hours to move through to the Round of 32, while Fabian Marozsan won in straight sets over French qualifier Corentin Moutet.