One of the dark horses of the competition from the start, Jannik Sinner has enjoyed a hassle-free route to his maiden Slam final. A model of efficiency, having spent five hours and 49 minutes less on court, the 22-year-old did not drop a set until the semifinals. He contained seeds Sebastian Baez, Karen Khachanov and Andrey Rublev without too much fuss before he pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the tournament defeating defending champion Novak Djokovic in the Semifinal. Australian Open 2024 Day 14 Highlights Daily Round-Up and Match Results: Aryna Sabalenka Defends Women’s Singles Crown, Rohan Bopanna Wins Historic Men’s Doubles Title With Matthew Ebden.

One important aspect of his win over Djokovic was the manner in which he defeated World Number One. He didn’t give Djokovic a single breakpoint chance, dominating the match right from the word go. In the tournament, Sinner has won 78 per cent of first-serve points and remained equally efficient on the second serve. With this, He has been broken just twice in 88 service games and dropped only one set out of 19 played. The Italian is certainly at the peak of his power and could be seen as the favourite to win the title.

In head-to-head matchups, Sinner has won three out of nine encounters, but more importantly, all those three wins came last year, with two of them on the hard court, giving him a slight upper hand in the match. But Medvedev is not a push-over as we have seen so far in the tournament. Nevertheless, Tennis fans will be treated with a great match – even without either of  the traditional big three in the final.

If the 22-year-old Italian wins the ultimate prize, he will become the youngest champion since a 20-year-old Djokovic at AO 2008, and only the second Italian man in the Open era to claim a major after Adriano Panatta at Roland Garros 1976. With history on the cards, Sinner would go all in for the Australian Open 2024 Men’s Singles final.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Jan 28, 2024 12:19 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).