Sinner poured heat on Alcaraz s number 1 position

The 500 points won by winning the Vienna Open gave Sinner 10,500 points, 840 points less than Alcaraz's top position in the ATP table. The race for number one this year will only take place between these two players, when third person Alexander Zverev only has 6,160 points.

Zverev is last year's Paris Masters champion, the last Masters event of the year taking place this week. A huge advantage for Sinner is that he does not have to guard the point at the tournament in the French capital because he was absent last year. Alcaraz also only needs to go beyond the third round to get more points.

Sinner's challenge will increase significantly when he has to defend 1,500 points at the ATP Finals. Meanwhile, this is an opportunity for Alcaraz to hunt for the missing major title, as well as ensure the number one position in the world.

In case Sinner wins both the Paris Masters and the ATP Finals, the Italian player still needs Alcaraz to not win more than 461 points in these two events. This is unlikely to happen considering Alcaraz's class. But in recent years, the 22-year-old tennis player has often disappointed in indoor hard court tournaments. In the final match of the recent Six Kings Slam friendly tournament in Saudi Arabia, Alcaraz quickly lost to Sinner after two sets.

In the past, Alcaraz's best results were the quarterfinals of the Paris Masters 2022 and the semi-finals of the 2023 ATP Finals. It was not until the beginning of this year that he won his first indoor hard court title at the Rotterdam Open.

"I think I don't have many chances left, " Sinner said about the match. compete for world number one with Alcaraz, after defeating Zverev in the Vienna Open final last week. "I will fight to the end, but the right to decide is no longer available. Instead, I want to improve myself, reaching new title milestones in my career ".

According to the results of the division, Sinner is exempt from the first round and can face Miomir Kecmanovic in the third round, meet Andrey Rublev or Ben Shelton in the quarterfinals. He shares the semi-finals with compatriots Lorenzo Musetti and Zverev.

Alcaraz also plays in the second round, meeting either Cameron Norrie or Sebastian Baez. The Spanish player can then face Jiri Lehecka, who defeated him at the 2025 Qatar Open and is also in good form. Alcaraz's branch also includes Valentin Vacherot or Arthur Rinderknech, two players who reached the final of the Shanghai Masters in mid-month.