Jannik Sinner found his serve and forehand just when he needed them, and beat Carlos Alcaraz—and the wind—in a tactical tug of war

“I’m happy to win at least one big trophy on this surface,” Jannik Sinner said after on Sunday. “I haven’t done it before, so it means a lot to me.”

Did those words surprise you? They surprised me when I heard Sinner utter them right after the match. I had completely forgotten that this was the first high-level clay title of his career. He seems so far beyond such youthful breakthroughs. This is a guy who had already been No. 1 for 66 weeks, and won four majors and seven Masters 1000s. He’s also from Italy, a nation of natural-born dirt-ballers. Yet before Sunday, Sinner had just one clay-court win, at a 250 in Umag, four years ago.

So you can understand why, as Alcaraz’s final forehand overshot the baseline, Sinner would drop to the surface in a show of emotion that wouldn’t have been out of place after a victory in Paris. Monte Carlo is his adopted hometown, as well as a tournament he wasn’t allowed to enter a year ago due to a doping suspension. That suspension played a role in dropping him to No. 2 in the rankings behind Alcaraz. This win puts him back on top.

“Thanks for pushing me to the limit,” Sinner said to his team afterward. “Trying to learn again how to play on this surface.”

Sinner’s triumph does a lot for him—for his ranking, his season, his chances at Roland Garros, even his place in history. As Alcaraz noted, the Italian is the second player, after Novak Djokovic in 2015, to win the Sunshine Double on hard courts in Indian Wells and Miami, and then cross the Atlantic to win Monte Carlo on clay two weeks later. Whatever we call this achievement, it’s a sign of rare versatility and persistence.

Maybe most significantly, the win marks Sinner’s first successful foray onto his main rival’s turf. Alcaraz, in the tradition of his countryman Rafael Nadal, has made clay his kingdom. He has won 11 of his 26 titles on it, including the last two at Roland Garros. On the flipside, he has had no trouble invading Sinner’s hard-court home base, beating him seven times on that surface. Now Sinner has launched a counterattack.

One point you play a point with the wind helping and the next point it was totally opposite. - Carlos Alcaraz

And he has earned it. This win took work, thought, and patience. The match was far from the classic that these two staged in Paris a year ago, but it was a fascinating contest nonetheless. From the start, there was a mercurial third foe in the arena with them: The wind, which hadn’t been much of a factor earlier in the week. Today it forced both men to play in uncharacteristically conservative ways, and make uncharacteristic errors.

“Today’s wind was a little bit tricky because it wasn’t in just one direction,” Alcaraz said. “It was twirling around. One point you play a point with the wind helping and the next point it was totally opposite.”

Read more: Jannik Sinner keeps winning streak against No. 1s going with latest victory over Alcaraz

It began with the serve. Normally, Sinner and Alcaraz make well over 60% of their first serves; on Sunday Alcaraz made 58%, and Sinner just 51. Life was even more difficult when the rallies began: Alcaraz hit 20 winners and made 48 errors; Sinner hit 13 winners and made 38 errors. Alcaraz sent his backhand over the baseline all afternoon, and struggled to direct it down the line. Sinner had similar troubles with his normally lethal forehand. In the second game, Sinner was broken on a wild forehand. In the next game, Alcaraz gave the break right back with a forehand misfire of his own.

Despite the shaky start and woeful winner-to-error ratio, both men managed to hold their way to a first-set tiebreaker. At 4-4, Sinner blew a break point with a forehand error; but at 5-6, he dug out a tough hold with two well-timed service winners.

Sinner’s serve arrived just in time to save him the set. Then it won it for him. In the tiebreaker, he made all six of his first serves, three of which won him the point outright. In the end, though, a surprise eruption of nerves decided the outcome. At 6-4, Sinner drilled an easy forehand into the net from point-blank range. At 5-6, Alcaraz returned the gift by double-faulting.

In the second set, it was Sinner’s forehand that showed up when he needed it. Down a break at 1-3, and unable to find the corners with his ground strokes, Sinner finally let loose with a 107-m.p.h. forehand winner. Soon after, he broke back for 3-3 with another heavy forehand, and broke again for 5-3 with another set of well-struck forehands.

“I felt close on the return games,” Sinner said of his second-set comeback. “I had a feeling that the new ball helped me. The ball change was at 2-1. I just tried to stay there mentally, to keep pushing. I felt a bit tired, so I needed to keep up with the right mentality.”

Alcaraz was left to rue missed opportunities, and a title defense that got away.

“I would say that the important moments, the important points, I didn’t play well,” he said. “I had so many opportunities in the match that I didn’t take it. I think the first tiebreak, I didn’t play well and I think he just played unbelievable tennis when it mattered. I think that was the key today.”

Sinner, by contrast, got exactly what he wanted from this week.

“We came here trying to get as many matches as possible, getting good feedback before other big tournaments coming up,” he said. “Today was a high level from both of us. It was a bit windy, a bit breezy. Different conditions from what the tournament has brought. The result is amazing.”

Sinner’s right: Whatever the stats may say, and however high the error count may have been, this was a well-played match. From his perspective, the feedback about his rivalry with Alcaraz couldn’t have been better. He read the Spaniard’s drop shots. He willed himself to find his serve and forehand when he needed them, on a day when they were both off. He reclaimed the No. 1 ranking. And, maybe most important for what lies ahead, he took a little piece of Alcaraz’s turf.