Jannik Sinner joins Federer, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray on legendary list with 25th win in a row

Jannik Sinner put on a show in front of a packed home crowd in Rome on Thursday night, storming past Casper Ruud, 6-0, 6-1, to reach the semifinals of the Internazionali BNL d'Italia.

And with that win, his 25th in a row, he joined a legendary list.

The No. 1-ranked Italian is just the fifth man this century to record a winning streak of 25 or more tour-level matches in a row, after Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray.

MEN TO WIN 25+ MATCHES IN A ROW THIS CENTURY (tour-level):

• Federer: 4 times [streak lengths: 41, 35, 26, 25]
• Nadal: 2 times [streak lengths: 32, 26]
• Djokovic: 4 times [streak lengths: 43, 29, 28, 28]
• Murray: 1 time [streak length: 28]
• Sinner: 1 time [streak length: 25 and counting]

Sinner's last loss came to Carlos Alcaraz in the Beijing final last October, and since then his 25-match winning streak includes six wins en route to the title in Shanghai, five wins en route to the title at the ATP Finals, three wins at the Davis Cup Finals, seven wins en route to the Australian Open title and now four wins so far in Rome.

Sinner had never lost a set to Ruud in their three previous meetings, but this was the first time they were playing on clay, and Ruud was at the top of his game, winning his last nine matches in a row to win Madrid—his biggest title—and reach the quarterfinals in Rome.

But none of that mattered as an on-fire Sinner won the first eight games in a row for a 6-0, 2-0 lead before Ruud finally held to get on the board, 2-1, after which the Italian won another four games in a row to completely run away with it after just 63 minutes.

Sinner finished the match with more than twice as many winners as unforced errors, 22 to 10, with the most damage coming from his forehand wing (13 winners to 6 unforced errors).

He won 55 points in the match to Ruud's 22.

"I was feeling great on court today, I think we all saw that," Sinner said in his on-court interview after the match. "My goal in this tournament was trying to understand where my level is, and it's raised day by day, so I'm very happy about that. It doesn't really matter the result, but what I felt today was very, very positive signs for me.

"Everything can change in one day—one performance doesn't tell everything of my shape now—but I'm very happy.

"I think today everything worked very, very well."

Awaiting Sinner in the semifinals will be American Tommy Paul, who defeated Hubert Hurkacz in his quarterfinal match, 7-6 (4), 6-3.

Sinner leads Paul in their head-to-head, 3-1, and 1-0 on clay—though that clay-court meeting could have gone either way, with the Italian prevailing in Madrid in 2022, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (4), 6-3.

Paul's win came in the pair's only grass-court meeting, a 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 victory in Eastbourne in 2022.