PARIS — Adriano Panatta was expecting to award the French Open trophy to Jannik Sinner 50 years after his triumph in Paris.
Turns out he might still hand over the Coupe des Mousquetaires to a fellow Italian after the men’s singles final on Sunday after being invited by Roland Garros to take care of the honors on the anniversary of his 1976 triumph.
Despite Sinner's stunning loss in the second round, Italy is assured to have a player in the championship match since Flavio Cobolli will face compatriot Matteo Arnaldi in the semifinals on Friday.
Cobolli comes from the same tennis club in Rome as Panatta did. Panatta’s father was the caretaker at the Tennis Club Parioli.
Several years ago, Cobolli and his father and coach, Stefano, paid Panatta a visit at the club in Treviso, northern Italy, that Panatta created after his playing career.
“I told them he was going to be a great player,” Panatta said. “Of course, I didn’t realize it would be so soon.”
While Sinner came close last year when he had three match points in a five-set loss to Carlos Alcaraz in the final, no Italian man has raised the singles trophy in Paris since Panatta.
Panatta recently looked back on the 1976 tournament in an interview with The Associated Press.
Beating Borg
Panatta was the only man to beat Bjorn Borg twice at the French Open, in the fourth round in 1973 and in the quarterfinals in 1976. The only other time they met in Paris was in 1975 when Borg won in the semifinals and went on to claim the second of his six Roland Garros titles.
“I liked playing these clay-court specialists like Borg and (Guillermo) Vilas,” said Panatta, who beat Vilas in the Italian Open final just before winning the French Open. “I had a very varied game and attacked a lot and hit a lot of drop shots. I didn’t play like them.
“If two players play the same way, the stronger player always wins. I played with a different style and that probably bothered them.”
Sneaker emergency
Panatta beat two more clay-court specialists, Americans Eddie Dibbs and Harold Solomon, in the semifinals and final, respectively.
The final was a rematch of a controversial quarterfinal in Rome between Panatta and Solomon in which Solomon walked away while serving for the match after getting infuriated over a perceived missed call.
“He’s the one who made it an incident," Panatta said. “When you walk away, you’re responsible.”
Needless to say, both players were motivated for the rematch in the Paris final.
But Panatta had a problem when he realized that his doubles partner, Paolo Bertolucci, had mistakenly taken his tennis sneakers home with him.
“(Bertolucci) had to fly back from Rome the morning of the final with my sneakers,” Panatta said.
Fortunately, the sneakers arrived in time and Panatta again beat Solomon — this time by winning a fourth-set tiebreaker.
$30,000 winner's check
Panatta said he received $30,000 for his French Open title — about what players who lose in the first round of qualifying earn now.
He's having a hard time wrapping his head around the current players' protesting for a bigger share of tournament revenues.
“I don’t really know the reasons behind it,” Panatta said. “But it makes me laugh.”
Panatta recalls how players boycotted Wimbledon in 1973 after Croatian player Nikola Pilić was suspended.
“We didn’t do it for money," Panatta said. “We did it because of Pilić.”
Sinner's perfection
While Panatta pines for the old days when there were more players like him who employed serve-and-volley tactics, he still appreciates players like Sinner who push the limits of baseline tennis.
“When there’s excellence, it’s never boring,” Panatta said. “When someone performs near the limit of perfection, it’s inspiring.”
Sinner’s sense of humor
Panatta was also invited to participate in the trophy ceremony in Rome last month when Sinner became the first Italian man to win that title since Panatta in 1976.
During the ceremony, Sinner jokingly told the 75-year-old Panatta that obviously he’s too young to have seen him play and that “my parents probably hadn’t even gotten together yet” back then.
Panatta was amused by Sinner’s comment and said it showed that Sinner “has got a sense of humor.”
Like Panatta, who drove rally cars and speed boats after he retired from tennis, Sinner has a taste for speed and likes to race go-karts and watch Formula 1.
“I hope he races when he stops playing, too,” Panatta said.
Davis Cup
Panatta crowned his extraordinary 1976 season by leading Italy to the Davis Cup title with a win over Chile in Santiago that was played amid the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet.
“That was when the Davis Cup was the real Davis Cup,” Panatta said. “It was worth just as much as a Grand Slam.”
So how does he distinguish his Italian Open, French Open and Davis Cup titles?
“Rome was the most sentimental because the Foro Italico was where I started to play tennis. Roland Garros was the most important one because it was a Grand Slam. And the Davis Cup was a team event and we had a team of players who knew each other since they were little kids,” Panatta said. “They were three entirely different emotions.”
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