Domination and GOAT are two words that are thrown around like confetti in sports circles. While GOAT, or ‘Greatest of All Time’, is a subjective term and is more a personal choice than a metric driven by statistics, domination is more objective.

There have been individuals and teams that have bossed certain eras in their respective sports: Manchester United in the late 1990s and early 2000s, the Australian cricket team across the same period, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo from 2008 to 2017, Usain Bolt from 2008 to 2016, and Jahangir Khan through the 1980s, to name a few. All

share a similar theme, sustained superiority for around 10 years. It makes sense, when you consider that an athlete is at the peak of their powers for around a decade.

However, there is one triumvirate which defied this common theme and ruled its sport for 20 years. It all started when a 21-year-old Roger Federer won the Wimbledon Championships in 2003. Rafael Nadal formed the second prong of the trio,

Of the ‘Big Three’ in tennis — Federer, Nadal and Djokovic — two have already retired and one seems on his way out. But aficionados need not fear for the sport. The baton has already been passed to two exciting prodigies, Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz

winning the French Open in 2005 on his first try. Novak Djokovic completed the ‘Big Three’, announcing himself on the global stage with an Australian Open victory aged 20. These three men would go on to win at least one Grand Slam every year till 2024.

Federer, being the oldest of the three, retired in 2022 with 20 Grand Slam victories. Nadal succumbed to his knee problems and decided to hang up his racket in 2024, bowing out on 22 Grand Slams. Djokovic is still playing at 37 and has become the most successful tennis player of all time, male or female, with an astonishing 24 Grand Slams.

From Federer’s first victory at Wimbledon in 2003, till Wimbledon 2024, where Djokovic was beaten in the final, the Big Three won a combined 66 Grand Slams out of 83. That’s a staggering 80 percent of the total Grand Slams over 21 years won by three people. Domination, in the truest sense of the word.

Hence, it was natural that tennis enthusiasts feared about their sport’s future once these three retired. Just look at the identity crisis football is going through these days, now that Messi and Ronaldo are no longer at the centre of everything. And the fears were not baseless, considering they’d seen an entire generation of players try and fail to break through the Big Three’s dominance. Who, if anyone, is going to carry the sport forward after these greats depart?

Call it fate or call it coincidence. In 2024, the first year in an eternity when the Big Three didn’t win a Grand Slam, the four titles were split evenly between Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz. And if their early-career exploits are anything to go by, we may be transitioning from one era of dominance into another. It’s tennis’ equivalent of Max Verstappen taking the baton from Lewis Hamilton.

Jannik the Merciless Jannik Sinner won both the hard court Grand Slams, lost to Alcaraz in the semi-finals of the French Open, and fell to a combination of Daniil Medvedev and tonsilitis in the quarter-finals of Wimbledon.

Tall, lanky and sporting red hair, Sinner is a sizeable presence on the tennis circuit. So are his supporters: most notably a group of friends called the “Carota Boys”, who dress up as carrots, drawing inspiration from his physical features and the fact he once ate a carrot during a match.

That’s where the fun and games end though. On the court, Sinner is a picture of utter concentration. His play style has been likened to Djokovic, in the sense that he is primarily a baseline player with unbelievable defence. In 2023, he altered his serving stance, which has helped him become one of the best servers on the tour.

The biggest weapon in his arsenal, however, is his sheer consistency. Before committing to tennis, Sinner participated in professional skiing, where he embraced the value of not committing mistakes.

During one of his matches at the US Open last year, the TV coverage displayed a graphic comparing the points of contact during serving for some of the top players. All the players’ graphics showed a variance in the position of balls, characterising their contact points. All the players except Sinner, whose graphic showed several balls superimposed on top of each other.

This level of consistency, drilled in through countless hours on the training court, is visible in all aspects of his game. His groundstroke accuracy and consistency allow him to control points from the baseline, making his opponents run themselves into the ground, as he alternates between cross-court and down the line shots metronomically.

Enroute to his first Grand Slam victory at the Australian Open in 2024, the 22-year-old Sinner beat Djokovic in the semi-finals and came from two sets behind to down Medvedev in the final, becoming only the second Italian man to win a Grand Slam title.

In the week succeeding the French Open, he rose to number 1 in the world rankings, the first-ever Italian to hold the accolade. He romped through to the US Open crown, defeating Taylor Fritz in the final in straight sets to become the first man since Guillermo Vilas in 1977 to win his first two Grand Slams in the same calendar year. Sinner beat Fritz again in the final of the ATP Finals to close out a dominant year.

The Spanish Wunderkind

Carlos Alcaraz won the non-hard court Grand Slams in 2024, even though he crashed out significantly early in the hard court events. The personification of the phrase ‘bundle of energy’, Alcaraz is often seen fooling around on the tour, taking part in multiple challenges for YouTube videos and, as other players joke, eating. His smile, sometimes even present during matches, is bright enough to light up a dark room.

During matches, however, his opponents know better than to let the smiling man-child fool them. Alcaraz, on first viewing, seems like the most complete player, even more so than Djokovic. Federer had this elegance and grace, Nadal an insane topspin forehand and the quickest pace on court, and Djokovic the baseline groundstrokes and impregnable defence. Alcaraz somehow feels like a blend of all of them.

He possesses every shot and style in the book: big first serve and volley, stay at the back and grind through with groundstrokes, absurd angles, drop shots, lobs, passing winners down the line, tweeners, you name it.

His racket speed is second to none, often hitting winners faster than 160 kph. And if that’s not fearsome enough, he has this unique ability to slowly dial up the pace on his groundstrokes, like a potentiometer, till the opponent buckles.

Blessed with exceptional athleticism, Alcaraz is one of the fastest runners the game has ever seen, which helps him return shots which would be winners against any other player. With a new serving style adopted in 2024 to make his first serve more potent, and a heavier racket — set to be used in 2025 to help with his shots’ speed — he will only be more dangerous.

Alcaraz was already a Grand Slam winner at 19 years old, winning the 2022 US Open. He also holds the record for the youngest-ever World No 1, and year-end No 1. In 2023, he defeated Djokovic in the final of Wimbledon in an enthralling five-setter for the ages.

He defeated Sinner in the semi-finals of the 2024 French Open enroute the title and swept aside Djokovic in the final of Wimbledon again, albeit in straight sets this time. He reached the gold-medal match at the Olympics, losing to Djokovic, before single-handedly winning the Laver Cup for Team Europe, a performance that earned him the nickname ‘Fed 05’, referencing peak Federer.

2025 and Beyond

The year 2025 promises to be a battle between these two exciting prodigies as they look to stamp their legacies on the sport. And it may be a contest which could carry on for a lot of years, emulating the Big Three.

Don’t count out the old fox, however. As he proved at the Olympics, when Djokovic really wants something, he can still prove to be unbeatable. And he would love another major title to move ahead of Margaret Court’s tally of 24 Grand Slams and be the outright leader.

Expect fireworks and scorchers in 2025, and beyond. Tennis seems to be in good hands.

The writer is a sports enthusiast with a background in supply chain management. X: @tahagoheer

Published in Dawn, EOS, January 26th, 2025