INALPI ARENA, TURIN, ITALY – 2025/11/14: Carlos Alcaraz of Spain poses with the year-end ATP No. 1 trophy presented to him during day six of the Nitto ATP Finals 2025. (Photo by Nicolò Campo/LightRocket via Getty Images)
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The main 2025 tennis season came to a dramatic end when Italy beat Spain to retain their Davis Cup title after an epic tussle in the singles. For once, the match between European heavyweights didn’t involve the two best players in the world. They may love their countries, but Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz are busy plotting against each other for the 2026 season. It’s all friendly fire, of course.
Sinner and Alcaraz are the new mentality monsters and must have watched Flavio Cobolli’s heroics with some admiration. Novak Djokovic would have liked Cobolli’s top-tearing tribute in the semifinal against Belgium. However, the sheer physicality of grueling battles in the slams has passed from the Djokovic and Nadal classic at Melbourne in 2012, to the brilliant French Open final of 2025 between the Next Gen giants. Tennis is very much alive, although the duopoly could do with some outside interference.
Alcaraz ended 2025 at the top of the PIF ATP rankings by a mere 550 points from Sinner. Their last battle of the year was at the ATP Finals, where the Italian used the exuberant Turin crowd to secure a much-needed win over the hobbled Spaniard. Despite sharing the last eight slams, it is Alcaraz who has the edge in the head-to-head, leading 10-6 and winning seven of the previous nine. The 22-year-old’s game has come on in leaps and bounds on the court and between the ears.
Alcaraz’s historical weak link has been a tendency to lose focus at critical junctures. That in-game ability to handle crises has improved since the 2023 U.S. Open semifinal against Daniil Medvedev, where he lost in four sets. That was the moment when the strain of being the new kid on the block became too much.
“After 3-3 in the tiebreak, let’s say, I lose my mind,” he admitted in the post-match press conference. “I make three or four points without control. (After) fighting for 50 minutes and then for four points, lose my mind, it was really tough for me to handle it.” There was a lack of maturity. This was the steel plate that Juan Carlos Ferrero’s charge needed to back up in that desktop menu of delicious shots.
The mini-crises for Alcaraz tend to start when the smile gives way to overt seriousness. “I was struggling a little with my tennis, my joy,” he said during an eight-month barren period after the five-set win over Djokovic in the 2023 Wimbledon final. When he beat Sinner in the 2024 French Open last four, the Spaniard talked about finding the joy in suffering. Clearly, it is a theme with his team. Embracing the uncertainty in a match gives him the freedom to make shots that are in his unique inventory.
The deeper thoughts can work against him, which is bad news for someone who plays on instinct. The Sunshine Double turned dark in 2025 after he became so obsessed with the strength of Jack Draper’s game at Indian Wells. The subsequent loss to David Goffin in Miami also felt like a temporary loss of tennis serenity. Alcaraz needs to feel alive on court to perform.
Those topsy-turvy matches are now a minimal sample in a 71-9 season with eight titles. His animated and explosive game has been more prone to errors in the past, added to a volatility in frustration that exacerbates the clear and present danger of a solid opponent. In this year’s Wimbledon, he screamed that Sinner was so much better from the back of the court. Alcaraz’s Flushing Meadows fortnight was the high point where he allied automaton efficiency to pure artistry, winning 97 per cent of service games.
Alcaraz has recently spoken about how he has less need for team psychologist, Isabel Balaguer, after finding a better pathway to cope with the troubling aspects. “I’m just really happy to have found the right path again and such good joy on the court. For me, it is not about winning or losing. For me, it’s about having fun playing tennis, having fun stepping on court. Not thinking about the result. It’s just living the moment.”
It’s a philosophy that makes him so dangerous. Six-time snooker world champion Steve Davis once said that the biggest challenge was to play as if it means nothing when it means everything. Alcaraz, at his best, doesn’t seem to give a damn.
The 2025 Australian Open was probably the last big one that the six-time slam winner got completely wrong. He wasn’t the first to be distracted by a Djokovic injury. Alcaraz 2.0 is putting the hammer down, and only Sinner can fully challenge. The 2026 tennis triathlon will start again soon enough.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/timellis/2025/11/27/carlos-alcaraz-has-cut-out-the-mental-dips-to-become-world-no1/
