Jannik Sinner and Alexander Zverev meet at Wimbledon, now both major champions. Will that change anything?

THE ALL ENGLAND CLUB, London — There is little doubt as to whether Alexander Zverev enters the Wimbledon men’s final as the underdog.

Zverev looked superb Friday in a routine semifinal win against Arthur Féry, the British wild card. But there is superb, and then there is Jannik Sinner’s serve against Novak Djokovic in the other men’s semifinal.

Throughout the tournament, the defending champion and world No. 1 has looked a little wobblier than usual from the baseline; his serve has not only propelled him out of danger, but prevented him from really experiencing it.

Against Djokovic, the seven-time champion at the All England Club, Sinner finally put it all together to deliver a 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 win that was as smooth and symmetrical as its scoreline.

Besides his excellent play, Sinner owns Zverev in their head-to-head. He is 10-4, with nine consecutive wins, one of them dominant in the 2025 Australian Open final.

Zverev, 29, has not taken a set off Sinner in the last seven. The last time they played, at the Madrid Open final in May, it took Sinner less than an hour to shoo Zverev off the court in a 6-1, 6-2 rout that wasn’t even that close.

But as they prepare for their 15th career meeting Sunday on Wimbledon’s Centre Court, Zverev and Sinner’s rivalry has changed in one drastic way: they are both Grand Slam champions now.

After spending years saddled with the tag of the best active player without a major, his claiming the French Open title last month seems to have settled Zverev and increased his focus, especially during a tournament where he knows he has another golden opportunity, with world No. 2 Carlos Alcaraz still waylaid by a wrist injury.

Both finalists spoke Friday about his noticeably increased confidence on court.

“I think there’s two things to it. I think, yes, one thing, for sure, once you win a major you know how to do it and you feel like you can do it again. You have this feeling inside of you,” Zverev said in a news conference after beating Féry, the 23-year-old world No. 114 who will rise to No. 36 Monday, following his 7-6(0), 6-2, 6-4 defeat in the last four.

“The second thing: I feel like I worked on my game a lot. I feel like my game has improved. Sometimes in sports it’s as simple as that.”

For the past year, Zverev has been talking about needing to be more aggressive in order to win titles and narrow the gap between himself — the world No. 3 — and Sinner and Alcaraz.

He played that way in his semifinal win Friday, putting more muscle behind his forehand for 22 winners on that side while revving his primary weapons, his serve and backhand.

He could also benefit from the final’s 4 p.m. start time this year on what’s expected to be a baking hot day with temperatures in the mid-80s. Sinner, though he said he prepared ahead of Wimbledon for the London heat wave, has previously wilted in hot conditions and has not really played a match in them as yet.

Zverev has also dropped just two sets on the way to the final, maintaining his form like few French Open winners can at Wimbledon, with just two weeks between the tournaments. He enters Sunday’s final looking to become the seventh man in the Open Era to win back-to-back French Open and Wimbledon crowns, after Alcaraz, Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Björn Borg and Rod Laver. Such an achievement had looked implausible for Zverev’s entire career. In the space of a month, it is one win away.

It isn’t easy keeping a high level after winning a first Grand Slam, wherever it falls on the calendar. Zverev benefits from his coming later, but even that could have felt like reaching the mountain top, instead of a pit stop along the way.

“It’s very individual. I think different people, I think Dominic Thiem, in particular, he put his whole life and soul into winning that Slam,” Zverev, who lost to Thiem in a 2020 U.S. Open final paralyzed by nerves, said Friday.

“I think it was such a relief for him that it was maybe a bit too much of a relief mentally. For me, I stay focused. I stay hungry. I want more. I want to continue playing at the best level and continue winning. I hope I’m able to do that, and again on Sunday I have another big chance.”

With all that confidence comes a counter argument. Sinner knows Zverev didn’t have to beat him, nor Alcaraz, nor Djokovic to claim that French Open title. On top of everything else he’s accomplished in his career, Sinner can say his Grand Slam titles have come with wins over those two.

Sunday’s final will be a clash of dominant servers — Sinner has won 94 percent of his service games, Zverev has won 95 percent; Sinner has seen 52 percent of his first serves gone unreturned, Zverev 53 percent — though Sinner has been particularly potent with his serve all year.

“Attack? You cannot attack his first serve,” Djokovic said in a news conference Friday. “You can try to read it, chip it, block it, get it back in play.”

But Sinner, with his lacerating groundstrokes and impeccable anticipation, has a returning edge over Zverev.

The German has put 59 percent of his first-serve returns in, average for the tournament. Sinner checks in with 63 percent.

That first strike against Zverev’s serve will be critical Sunday, with Wimbledon’s grass having baked in the hot sun for a couple of weeks and playing fast. Sinner expects a lack of rhythm and for Zverev to put their past aside and come out assertively.

“Whatever happened in the past between me and him, it happened. In between, he won a Grand Slam in Paris, which gave him a lot of confidence. We can see the level he’s producing here,” Sinner said in a news conference.

The 24-year-old is producing quite a level himself, and right on time. He played dominantly against Djokovic on Friday, adjusting his level to meet his opponent having been uneven for most of the tournament. No matter how much confidence and aggressiveness Zverev is playing with, the final is still Sinner’s to lose.

This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

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