About an hour before the start of his quarter-final here with Roman Safiullin on Tuesday, Jannik Sinner sat in the players area at the All England Club with his hood up, tight to his face, shutting out the world. Tipped as a future world No 1 since he burst on to the scene a couple of years ago, the Italian had lost all of four previous grand slam quarter‑finals. Fifth time round, he was desperate to get everything right: 2hr 14min later, Sinner had completed the job, his 6-4, 3-6, 6-2, 6-2 win against the 25-year-old Russian taking him into the Wimbledon semi-finals.
“It means a lot to me,” the softly spoken Italian said. “We put many hours of work in and many sacrifices off court for this moment.”
