There is a residue of negotiations, but it is minimal, almost non-existent: between Riccardo Piatti and Jannick Sinner the divorce is now consummated, so much so that today Jannik was training in Monte Carlo with Simone Vagnozzi, the coach who brought Marco Cecchinato from almost anonymity at the semifinals of Roland Garros in 2018, and who then coached the other blue Stefano Travaglia. The most accredited hypothesis is that in the future it will be a tandem to follow the number 10 in the world, composed of Vagnozzi himself and Magnus Norman, the former coach of Stan Wawrinka whose center, just outside Stockholm, has a well-targeted name : “Good to Great Academy”, the academy that aims to transform – as happened with Wawrinka – good players into great ones, capable of winning a Grand Slam the goal that Jannik has never hidden, and to achieve which he has convinced – thanks to the burning and clear defeat against Tsitsipas in Australia – of having to change “the bench”. As is also the case in football, only this time the results were anything but disappointing, given that at 20 Jannik has already entered the top 10 in the world, has won 4 tournaments, reached the quarterfinals in the Grand Slam several times and the final of a Masters 1000 and earned $ 4.2 million in prize money alone.
A sudden and unexpected ending, at least in timing, which took the Piatti clan by surprise. There had been some disagreements between Sinner and his coach (also in Australia): on technical issues but also on staff organization, with disagreements on how the supercoach issue had been handled, the past champion (Becker, McEnroe) who he would have had to work alongside Piatti in part time. However, everything seemed to be part of the routine. What precipitated the situation definitively was the disagreement on the programming of this beginning of 2022. Piatti after the Australian Open had already foreseen a training period and the return for the qualification of Davis in Bratislava (4-5 March), given that Jannik in practice had never stopped between the Davis Cup Finals and the Australian away game. Sinner, on the other hand, was anxious to play, in fact he is enrolled in the ATP 500 in Dubai, which begins on February 21st. A staff meeting was scheduled for February 8, but Jannik said he would not show up. However, a subsequent phone call between Sinner and Piatti did not resolve the issue, so much so that both the physical trainer Dalibor Sirola and the physiotherapist Claudio Zimaglia returned home, while Andrea Volpini flew to Dubai in the company of another student of the Piatti Center, Marta Kostiuk. The dizzying growth of Jannik – in rankings, sponsors, pressures and ambitions – as it can happen has created tensions between Jannik and what he has always considered a second father, tensions not only of a technical nature. Also because over time Sinner’s entourage has grown, as has his value, both sporting and commercial, grown. So what seemed like a family crisis turned into a divorce that overwhelmed an apparently very solid relationship.
The choice to rely on a technician of value but not as well known as Vagnozzi may surprise, given the illustrious names that had been spent. The technician from the Marches, however, as a player, was a pupil of Max Sartori in Caldaro, South Tyrol, in the same “brood” as Andreas Seppi, Karin Knapp and the current current manager of Sinner, Alex Vittur. It was Vittur – who today works for the same company that also represents Norman – who introduced Sinner to Sartori, who in turn had reported him to Piatti. Behind the forward flight, in short, there is also a return to the roots.