Match Stats/Report - Sinner vs Auger-Aliassime, Paris final, 2025

[Waspsting]

Jannik Sinner beat Felix Auger-Aliassime 6-4, 7-6(4) in the Paris final, 2025 on indoor hard court

It was both players’ first final at the event. The result saw Sinner regain #1 ranking

Sinner won 74 points, Auger-Aliassime 60

Serve Stats
Sinner...
- 1st serve percentage (44/61) 72%
- 1st serve points won (40/44) 91%
- 2nd serve points won (11/17) 65%
- Aces 6
- Double Faults 2
- Unreturned Serve Percentage (19/61) 31%

Auger-Aliassime...
- 1st serve percentage (47/73) 64%
- 1st serve points won (38/47) 81%
- 2nd serve points won (12/26) 46%
- Aces 8
- Double Faults 2
- Unreturned Serve Percentage (22/73) 30%

Serve Pattern
Sinner served...
- to FH 29%
- to BH 69%
- to Body 2%

Auger-Aliassime served...
- to FH 41%
- to BH 52%
- to Body 7%

Return Stats
Sinner made...
- 49 (21 FH, 28 BH)
- 14 Errors, comprising...
- 3 Unforced (1 FH, 2 BH)
- 11 Forced (6 FH, 5 BH)
- Return Rate (49/71) 69%

Auger-Aliassime made...
- 40 (14 FH, 26 BH), including 5 runaround FHs
- 13 Errors, comprising...
- 6 Unforced (1 FH, 5 BH), including 1 runaround FH
- 7 Forced (5 FH, 2 BH)
- Return Rate (40/59) 68%

Break Points
Sinner 1/6 (3 games)
Auger-Aliassime 0

Winners (including returns, excluding aces)
Sinner 18 (13 FH, 2 BH, 1 FHV, 2 OH)
Auger-Aliassime 13 (8 FH, 1 BH, 2 FHV, 2 OH)

Sinner's FHs - 4 cc (1 at net), 1 cc/inside-in, 3 inside-out, 1 longline (not clean), 1 longline/inside-in, 2 drop shots, 1 lob
- BHs - 1 cc, 1 dtl

- the FHV was a non-net, swinging cc shot & 1 OH was on the bounce from just behind service line (marked a retreated net point)

Auger-Aliassime's FHs - 2 cc, 1 cc/inside-in, 2 dtl, 1 inside-out/dtl, 2 inside-in
- BH pass - 1 cc

- 1 FHV was a swinging inside-in from around service line, 1 OH was from around service line & 1 OH was on the bounce (both shots from around service line have been marked net points)

Errors (excluding returns and serves)
Sinner 23
- 11 Unforced (4 FH, 7 BH)
- 12 Forced (3 FH, 8 BH, 1 BHV)... with 1 FH running-down-drop-shot at net
Unforced Error Forcefulness Index 43.6

Auger-Aliassime 35
- 25 Unforced (16 FH, 9 BH)
- 10 Forced (1 FH, 6 BH, 1 Back-to-Net, 1 Tweener)
Unforced Error Forcefulness Index 44.4

(Note 1: all half-volleys refer to such shots played at net. Half -volleys played from other parts of the court are included within relevant groundstroke counts)

(Note 2: the Unforced Error Forcefulness Index is an indicator of how aggressive the average UE was. The numbers presented are keyed on 4 categories - 20 defensive, 40 neutral, 50 attacking and 60 winner attempt)

Net Points & Serve-Volley
Sinner was 6/9 (67%) at net, with...
- 1/1 retreated

Auger-Aliassime was...
- 11/17 (65%) at net, including...
- 1/1 serve-volleying, a 1st serve
---
- 0/4 forced back

Match Report
Meat & potatoes, dual winged baseline match and Sinner is sizeably better from the back in all ways. Strong serving keeps Auger-Aliassime in the match, but Sinner near matches him on that front, on top of his baseline superiority. The court is slowish

Statistically, it’s a funny - hence, deceptive - match. Sans the FHs, everything else is near identical -
- unreturned serves - Sinner 31%, Felix 30%
- double faults - both 2
- non-FH winners - both 5
- non-FH UEs - Sinner 7, Felix 9
- non-FH FEs - Sinner both 9

FHs though favour Sinner, and his numbers there are first class. On the FH -
- Sinner 13 winners, 4 UEs, 3 FEs
- Felix 8 winners, 16 UEs, 1 FE

13 winners, 4 UEs is as high end as it gets in a baseline match
Felix has 13 winners from all shots, Sinner has 5 from all non-FHs
The other 3 groundies on show have 7, 9 and 16 UEs respectively
And Felix’ 16 UEs is match high by about double

Both players with about 30% freebies. A good start, but not a lockdown serve figure. After which
- Sinner has 18 winners, 11 UEs, forces 10 errors
- Felix 13 winners, 25 UEs, forces 12 errors

… or winners/UE differential - Sinner +7, Felix -12
Aggressively ended points/UE differential - Sinner +17, Felix 0

Would think this was an annihilation to look at all that. Sinner with first class figures, Felix below par and the freebie cushion not high enough to compensate
It isn’t an annihilation. Sinner is cozily superior, but not an annihilation.

Sinner breaks to start the match. And Sinner wins tiebreak 7-4 to end it
In between, 21 holds, in which Sinner wins 54% of points, serving 47% with break points reading Sinner 0/5 (2 games), Felix 0
Call that the general run of play. Sinner better, but not annihilating
Felix not even too hassled to hold serve, though he is shut-out on return. He gets to deuce once

Some very good serving from Felix in the match then. ‘Just’ 30% freebies, but disproportionately high lot of points he wins (his winners and the errors he forces in particular) are in his service games. In other words, he backs up his serve very well.

Even 46% second serve points won is a boon for him, given Sinner wins 65% of his
Second serve points are similar and normal - regular returning and 50-50 prospects for upcoming rally. Credit Felix for winning (relatively) high lot of his own, not discredit him for winning low lot of second return points or Sinner for not winning higher lot of Felix’ second serve ones

‘Take care of my serve, and wait and around for chances on return’ sums up how Felix goes about the match - and he’s done it well. Just so happens, chances on return don’t come up at all because Sinner’s so much the better the player

Enough the better player that one would expect him to break and threaten to more often then he’s been able to. Some very good serving and honed in playing on service games for Felix is behind that

Serve & Return
Good serving from both - Felix bigger and stronger
Sinner returning correspondingly better to cancel that out and leave serve-return duel about equal

Takes a particularly good (powerful and wide) serve to win point outright against Sinner
Against Felix, hefty and not too wide does the job fair amount of time. Same serve to Sinner is liable to be neutralizingly bopped back

First serve in - Sinner 72%, Felix 64%
First serve ace rate - Sinner 14%, Felix 17%
Second serve double fault rate - Sinner 12%, Felix 8%
Unreturned serves - Sinner 31%, Felix 30%

 

[Waspsting]

Good in counts for both. Sinner with healthy pace and not bad placement. Would take exceptionally good returning to regularly neutralize his minority, below average first serves (in swing zone, good pace) and his average good ones are good to draw unreturend serve or at least not strong return

Felix slightly lower in count. And higher lot of his first serves are challengingly wide and his serve is more powerful. And has to be, because below average ones are liable to be neutralized (unlike the other way around)
Slight advantage for Felix on ace rate good indicator of difference in quality of serves. Its not for movement differences on the return that he’s got a 3% lead there
Double faults aren’t too important, given the high in counts. It’s more important for Felix because his second serves are apt to be firmly thumped back + his not doing too well from rallies that start off from that sort of position

Unreutned serves from returner’s point of view -
- UEs - Sinner 3, Felix 6
- FEs - Sinner 11, Felix 7
- Aced - Sinner 8, Felix 6

Supporting idea that serve has to be particularly good to draw error from Sinner, less so Felix
Also, Felix delivering better serves more often

Sinner’s defensive returning is average. As in, good wide serves that one would credit returner for making, he usually doesn’t make. A high level aspect of returning. But as low UEs indicate, he misses very little that’s routine, including minority powerful serves that are coverable by a step.

The Sinner serve vs Felix return a cut below on both fronts than other ways around. Felix missing a few more routine returns (in light of Sinner barely missing any), keeping the unreturned rates even

Gist - Felix better serve (of pace and placement), back cut a little by Sinner with slightly higher in count (both good) + Sinner with better return (mostly in being very solid against limited regulation returns, where he’s very solid) = serve-return about even

Play - Baseline (& Net)
Action is stanadard, dual winged baseline stuff. Both players looking to stay solid with BH, and move towards dominating with FH. Sinner’s better at everything - more powerful, more secure, better mover, better shot resistance - and off both wings. Felix is discreditworthy sloppy with the UEs early on, but after that, is good enough but just happens to not be good as opponent

Winners and UEs by shot in baseline rallies -
- Sinner FH 11 and 4
- Felix FH 8 and 16
- Sinner BH 2 and 7
- Felix BH 0 and 9

To go with errors forced of Sinner 6, Felix 4 (all but 1 FE - A Felix FH - are BHs)

Felix has done well to stay close to even on BH UEs. He’s almost always reacting, if not defending off that wing. Sinner very comfy in leading with powerful shots and not pushing envelope with it. To be clear, Felix is relegated to reacting, but rarely to extent of being ‘bossed’ about. But he’s nowhere near doing any bossing himself. That’s a good outcome from him, in that light
Felix somewhat moving over to play FHs instead of BHs, so he’s playing fewer BHs than Sinner

The 4-16 UE balance on the FH best gets to Sinner’s superiority. Despite good lot of winners and first class winners/UE differential, he’s not too aggressive off that wing either. Same shtick as BH - persistent strong hitting to battle Felix down

What Sinner does is closer to outlasting than outhitting play. Felix resisting being categorically outhit, but relegated to reacting on both wings. Sinner, wisely enough, not pushing envelope to hit harder still and really overpower

9/11 Sinner's UEs are neutral shots (the other 2 are winner attempts). For Felix has 17 neutrals and 8 more aggressive ones
More credit to Sinner for solidity than discredit to Felix for looseness for how the FH UEs turn out

Felix’ best offence comes from move-over FH play. He gets some very nice angles out wide inside-out and that draws most (probably all) of of Sinners 4 BH FEs. And has 2 inside-in winners. Almost all the rest of of his offence springs from serve drawing weak return

Sinner, with contained hitting advantage, could probably do a lot more than he does to escalate into attacking. He mostly just sticks to clinically hitting stock shots to draw errors. He’s better hitter and obviously, more steady to come away with 4-16 FH UEs advantage as first line of play.
And when needed/wanted, the small matter of 11 FH winners to rain down as second line. Not a shabby second line

Tough for the reactive Felix to find net, which is one obvious escape from this hitting contest he can’t win. Rallying to net, he’s 10/16, Sinner is 6/9

Felix with 4 ‘volley’ winners, and 1 FE
Sinner on pass with just 1 winner, 7 FEs

Felix not great at putting away tricky OHs, and he’s 0/4 forced back from net. Still, more credit to Sinner from digging out good-enough smashes. OHs Felix makes aren’t killer, but would expect them to win point, and Sinner scrambling effectively to put them back in play and coming away with a few points

Sinner’s net points are near token. He could come in a lot more if he wanted to, but doesn’t have much need way things are from the baseline

Gist - Sinner better baseliner in all ways and mostly squeezing Felix out from the back court.
Felix is decent but outsteadied most of the time, and sloppy for minority

Match Progression
Bad start by Felix and early on, he can’t keep the ball in play for long

He’s broken first game with 3 neutral ground UEs. Sinner throws in a return to baseline based net point

There’s no more breaks in the set (or match). Takes Felix 4-5 games to start holding up his end of rallies. Serve is good keep him holding. Few good points and rallies in there, but unthreatening to server control
Sinner loses 3 service points for his 5 holds, Felix 6 point for 4 holds after the first game

Brilliant, short angled BH cc winner from Sinner to end a long rally

Another memorable point where Sinner neatly drop 1/2volleys the ball for what look like a winner, but Felix runs it down. Felix’ get catches net chord, leaving Sinner few options with the ball low and the 2 nose-to-nose at net. He hits it almost vertically up for a lob, clearing Felix and winning the point

Wonderful wide BH cc - FH cc 1-2 ending with winner by Felix in there too

In time, Sinner serves out to 15. Delivers an ace, whacks a FH cc winner after gaining ground in FH cc rally and to finish, dismisses a FH cc at net to a bad drop shot in the game

No breaks in second set, though Sinner has better of it
He serves 32 points for 6 holds, Felix 40
Break points - Sinner 0/5 (2 games), Felix 0

Action is more ball-bashy than first set, with Felix lasting longer in the rallies (and winning higher lot than earlier). Felix’ BH is pushed about a little. He eventually takes to moving over to play FHs instead when he can manage, and finds some nice, wide FH inside-out angles that are effective. And serves very well, to keep up good freebie rate

Felix saves 2 break points in opener. Rare instance of him overpowering Sinner to finish at net early in game. He saves both breaks points with unreturned first serves. Fairly contained ones

Again, few good rallies and few good combos of shots. Felix hits 3 winners in a row to hold to love and 2-1 (third ball FH inside-out’ish shot, BH cc pass after a baseline return by Sinner, and FH inside-in from a rally)

Another wide BH cc - FH cc combo ending with winner by Felix and a FH dtl winner from normal position. The pick of Sinner’s is a FH drop shot winner after a series of beat-down FHs

Felix is down 15-40 at 3-3. Saves first break point with commanding third ball approach and Sinner misses return to a on racquet first serve that’s been marked a UE. Felix aces away another break point and eventually holds with another ace

At 4-5, Sinner’s taken to deuce for only time in match, so he’s 2 points away from losing set. Feli with a routine FH UE at deuce and a routine first return miss to lose the game

Tiebreak soon after. And its decided by 1 mini-break, when Felix looks to dispatch a weak third ball FH dtl/inside-out for a winner. Balls there for the shot, but he’s usually not gone so directly for the kill from similar positions in the match

Sinner ends the match on a high note. Among standard BH cc rally, he sends one a little wider to open the court and dismisses the rejoinder BH dtl for winner. Like the 1 mini-break, more aggressive from the executor than had been his norm for match, but he pulls it off. Just his second BH winner of the match

Summing up, good, solidly strong display from Sinner. Serves well - and good enough to keep opponent on back-foot - and he’s simply fundamentally better from the baseline (hitting, consistency, shot-resistance, movement) to largely squeeze opponent out, with an extra attacking gear up his sleeve when he wants/needs it

Auger-Aliassime serves pointedly well (better than Sinner), and bar first 4-5 games, isn’t sloppy or bad from baseline, but Sinner is better. Outplayed as he is, he’s done well to make a competitive swing of things. His movement being same calibre as Sinner’s is crucial for that, since his ball-striking is 1 behind

 

[yama]

Sinner...
- 1st serve percentage (44/61) 72%
- 1st serve points won (40/44) 91%

This report came in early this time.
That's much appreciated.

Sinner's serve seems incredibly consistent now.
To raise his serve percentage this much in such a short time, he must have sacrificed something. Did you notice any changes compared to his previous serve?

If it's just his serve percentage going up, that would be unbelievable growth.
US Open's dismal serve percentage might have lit a fire under Sinner.

 

[Waspsting]

To raise his serve percentage this much in such a short time, he must have sacrificed something. Did you notice any changes compared to his previous serve?

He's somewhat contained in is placement. Very well calibratedly so

Fair amount of just a bit wide of swing zone type stuff. And its good to draw return errors and weak returns
Its not safe, let alone weak, serving but is a bit controlled, contained

Even his second serves are good to draw not strong returns that leave him with initiative
That kind of stuff would come back very differently against US Open final opponent