Jannik Sinner returns to the Foro Italico this week with one trophy left to chase on the ATP Masters 1000 circuit, and he will chase it where he has never chased anything else: at home.
The world No. 1 begins his Internazionali BNL d’Italia campaign in the second round against the winner of Sebastian Ofner and Alex Michelsen, opening a fortnight that could end with him becoming only the second man in tennis history to complete the Career Golden Masters.
Rome is the missing piece. Sinner owns nine ATP Masters 1000 titles spread across Toronto, Cincinnati, Shanghai, Indian Wells, Miami, Madrid, Paris and Monte Carlo, but he has never lifted the Italian Open trophy.
His best run in the Eternal City came last year, when he reached the final and lost to Carlos Alcaraz. Six previous appearances have produced a 14-6 record. A title this fortnight would join him with Novak Djokovic as the only men ever to have won every Masters 1000 event at least once.
The streak. Sinner arrives in Rome on the back of the most dominant Masters run the series has seen since it adopted its current format in 1990. His Madrid victory over Alexander Zverev on Sunday — a 6-1, 6-2 demolition that took 67 minutes — made him the first player to win five consecutive Masters 1000 titles, and the first to sweep the opening four Masters events of a single season.
He has not lost a Masters 1000 match since retiring in Shanghai last autumn and has dropped just one set in the streak. His 2026 record stands at 30-2.
The draw. Sinner sits at the top of a manageable opening section. Italian wild card Matteo Berrettini is a possible third-round opponent, though 26th seed Jakub Mensik — one of only two men to beat Sinner this season, in Doha back in February — sits in the same quarter and represents the more pointed early test.
If Sinner reaches the fourth round, he is seeded to face Arthur Fils, the in-form Frenchman he dispatched in straight sets in the Madrid semi-finals. Ben Shelton, Andrey Rublev and Frances Tiafoe are the other seeded names in his quarter.
The absences. Defending champion Carlos Alcaraz withdrew last week with a leg injury picked up in Madrid, and the Spaniard’s absence is the structural fact reshaping this draw. Sinner has not won a tour-level title in head-to-head competition with Alcaraz since 2024 in any final they have contested, and the Spaniard was the man who beat him here last year.
With Alcaraz also already ruled out of Roland Garros, the next two weeks represent the cleanest pathway Sinner has had at a major clay-court title in his career. Taylor Fritz, Jack Draper and Holger Rune have also pulled out.
The complication. Novak Djokovic, the six-time Rome champion, returns to the tour for the first time since a fourth-round exit at Indian Wells in March. The 38-year-old has been placed in the bottom half of the draw alongside second seed Zverev, opening against Marton Fucsovics or a qualifier and seeded to meet home favourite Lorenzo Musetti in the quarter-finals. A Sinner-Djokovic semi-final is the marquee projection. Whether Djokovic, six weeks without competitive play, can hold that line is the bottom-half question.
The history. No Italian man has won the singles title at the Foro Italico since Adriano Panatta in 1976. Sinner, 24, is the most credentialed Italian player ever to attempt to break that drought, and he will do so as the heavy favourite, the top seed, and the form player on the circuit. The pressure is largely of one direction. Main-draw men’s action begins Wednesday
