The first major tournament of the tennis season kicks off in Australia in Grand Slam fashion, and all of the tour stars will be sweating the heat and vying for the year's first major trophy. Next year has all kinds of levels of anticipation built up already, and there's still over a month to go before the ATP Tour touches down in Melbourne Park.
Next year's biggest storyline will be a continuation of 2025's, which was centered heavily on Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz, and how many times they could reach the finals of an event and face each other. Tennis fans may be about to face another year of that exact reality all over again.
For Sinner, he made some ground on his rival this past year, but still sits two Grand Slams behind Alcaraz. The new year could play out with Sinner equaling or surpassing Alcaraz, but what we do know is that Sinner's quest to overtake his pal will officially begin with his Australian Open defense, which he proclaimed while attending the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix.
Jannik Sinner continues to enjoy some time off, but Australia will soon arrive
Sinner will enter next January's Aussie Open not just as its standing champion, but twice over. He's won the event two years in a row, and he'll be seeking the Triple Crown. The way he played after his three-month suspension earlier in the year, and how he finished it by winning the Nitto ATP Finals, show he's fully capable of pulling off the three-peat.
Winning the year's first major isn't the only goal for Sinner in 2026, though. The four-time major champion has some work to do when it comes to the one court surface he has struggled the most on: the clay surface.
In early November, Sinner's coach, Darren Cahill, opened up on whether he would return to his coaching duties and, if so, what areas Sinner would need to focus on to further improve his tennis game.
The clay surface, on which the French Open and a handful of other key Masters 1000 events are played, has always been Sinner's least best surface. Mastering all three surfaces should be in the driver's manual for a player of Sinner's calibre, especially since clay is where Alcaraz excels most.
It was the same for Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal — the Spaniard was virtually unbeatable on clay, and he was titled "The King of Clay" for good reason. Nadal's 14 Roland Garros wins are the most of any tennis player in history. He also collected 63 clay-court titles across the Masters 500 and 1000 events.
Think about it — 63 of Nadal's 92 titles were won on the orange. That's an incredible achievement we may never see in tennis again, even with Alcaraz in play. In contrast, Federer only won 11 clay court titles out of his 102. One of those was the French Open, and six were Masters 1000 events: Hamburg (4x) and Madrid (2x), nowhere else.
Everywhere else, Federer was never able to conquer, but Nadal conquered everywhere. Sinner is the only player on tour that rivals Alcaraz, and could someday rival him for the better player. Mastering clay would certainly help, but then again, Federer never did, and many still consider him the better player over Nadal.
Sinner will have to wait until May to face the clay at the French Open, but there are several lead-up tournaments on clay that will give him the opportunity to rev up. Until then, tennis fans will next see Sinner making another Australian Open run. Let's be honest, it would be quite fun to witness a three-peat.