Djokovic overcomes physical issues to reach second round

Wimbledon 2025

Venue: All England Club Dates: 30 June-13 July

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World number one Jannik Sinner cruised into the second round at Wimbledon but third seed Alexander Zverev was stunned by Frenchman Arthur Rinderknech.

Contesting his first Grand Slam match since losing one of the all-time great French Open finals to Carlos Alcaraz last month, the top Italian seed lost just seven games in a dominant straight-set win over fellow Italian Luca Nardi.

The 23-year-old, a three-time major winner, comprehensively outclassed his 95th-ranked opponent in a 6-4 6-3 6-0 victory on Court One.

After completing an efficient victory in one hour and 48 minutes on the UK's hottest day of the year, Sinner will face Australian Aleksandar Vukic next.

"New tournament, new chances, new challenges," Sinner said, reflecting on his French Open loss.

"You have one opponent at a time, so obviously I try to keep going and enjoy playing here.

"If you don't enjoy playing on these courts, I don't know where you will enjoy [it]. I'm very happy to be here and let's see what is coming."

In a match that finished almost 24 hours after it started, suspended at one set apiece late on Monday night, Zverev came up short against the inspired Rinderknech in five sets.

Zverev twice served to stay in the match in the fourth set and recovered from a 4-1 deficit in the tie-break to force a decider.

But Rinderknech, the world number 72, held his nerve after securing an early break in the fifth to win 7-6 (7-3) 6-7 (8-10) 6-3 6-7 (5-7) 6-4 and achieve his first career victory over a top-five player.

Zverev, whose wait for a first major title goes on, is the fourth top-10 seed to exit the men's draw in the first two days at the All England Club, after seventh seed Lorenzo Musetti lost earlier on Tuesday.

After his devastating defeat by Alcaraz in Paris, in which he squandered a two-set lead and three championship points in a five-and-a-half-hour epic, Sinner announced his arrival as one of the title favourites at SW19.

He managed to produce this display despite having his only pre-Wimbledon grass-court tournament at the Halle Open cut short by a surprise second-round loss to Alexander Bublik.

Nardi, 21, offered resistance in the first set and managed to escape the first five break points he faced - but it was not long before Sinner asserted himself.

Eventually taking his seventh opportunity to clinch the breakthrough and capture the first set, Sinner carried that momentum into the second as he raced into a 3-0 lead.

The gulf between the players became increasingly apparent as the match wore on, with Nardi unable to live with Sinner's devastating combination of pace, power and precision hitting.

While the second set lasted less than 40 minutes, the third barely stretched beyond 20 as Sinner sealed victory with a third-set whitewash.

Demonstrating why he has reached at least the quarter-finals at Wimbledon for the past three years, he ended the match with 28 winners compared with just 17 unforced errors.

After Danish eighth seed Holger Rune and Russian ninth seed Daniil Medvedev both exited the tournament on Monday, the men's draw opened further with defeats for Musetti and Zverev.

Italian Musetti suffered a surprise first-round loss to qualifier Nikoloz Basilashvili, of Georgia.

Musetti was a Wimbledon semi-finalist last year but was beaten 6-2 4-6 7-5 6-1 on court two.

Alexander Bublik, Kazakhstan's 28th seed and winner of the Halle Open in the build-up to Wimbledon, served for the match in the fourth set against Spain's Jaume Munar.

But the French Open semi-finalist eventually lost 6-4 3-6 4-6 7-6 (7-5) 6-2.

American fifth seed Taylor Fritz returned to complete a five-set comeback victory after his match against Frenchman Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard was also suspended late on Monday.

Fritz, twice a quarter-finalist in SW19 and who prepared for this year's Wimbledon by winning grass-court tournaments in Eastbourne and Stuttgart, triumphed 6-7 (6-8) 6-7 (8-10) 6-4 7-6 (8-6) 6-4.