World No. 2 Jannik Sinner opened his quest for his first Rolex Paris Masters title by defeating Zizou Bergs 6-4, 6-2 in the second round and goes on to face Francisco Cerundolo for a place in the quarter-finals.
The Italian extended his winning streak on indoor hard courts to 22, while the Belgian No. 1 was unable to capture the biggest win of career, and drops to 0-4 against the top 5.
“I felt like mostly the movement was good,” said Sinner on court afterwards. “It’s a very unique court here. Usually I always struggled a bit, so I’m very happy to come through the first match. I’m very happy how I served today. I was very precise, and I also started off with a break straight away, which gives you a bit more confidence. I’m very happy about today’s performance.”
Bergs, a 26-year-old who is currently riding his highest world ranking of 39 having reached the Shanghai quarter-finals earlier this month, was severely tested in his opening service game which lasted twelve minutes and which unfortunately for him did not go in his favour.
Sinner held easily and Bergs was again under pressure in his next service game but came through eventually and had his first game on the scoreboard after 25 minutes – an indication of how long (or short) his evening would be.
Sinner, who still has a chance of reclaiming the World number one spot from Carlos Alcaraz by winning this event, held on to the break for the remainder of the first set and was rarely troubled, and he stepped up the gears in the second to break twice and extend his stay in the capital and prevented Bergs from reaching the last 16 at a Masters event for the second time in his career.
In Wednesday’s earlier match on centre court, defending champion Alexander Zverev dropped the first set before battling through 6-7 (5), 6-1, 7-5 against Camilo Ugo Carabelli in over two and a half hours.
Aiming to become just the second person to win successive titles (after Djokovic 2013-2015), the German had a 16-8 record at Masters events in 2025 with deep runs in Toronto and Cincinnati.
“This is a little different to the old stadium but it’s a beautiful centre court,” said Zverev on court afterwards. “The atmosphere here in France is always very loud and energetic. I have had some great memories here, especially in Paris.”
After cruising the second set and levelling the match, the current World number three was once again in trouble in the third set when he dropped serve to go 1-3 down but immediately broke back and held serve for three games all. Games went with serve until five all when Carabelli felt the pressure at deuce and threw in his fourth double fault to bring up breakpoint and Zverev took his chance with a delicate drop volley before serving out for a place in the last 16.
In his post-match interview, Zverev mentioned how he was disappointed with the slow speed of the courts in Paris, something he felt in Shanghai as well – when traditionally these two Masters events were always some of the fastest towards the end of the season.
“When you hit a fast shot, you don’t really get the reward, as the ball kind of stops,” he explained. “But then also, it is such a low bounce off the surface that if you hit the heavy shot, you don’t get the reward either because the ball is stopping again. Unfortunately, that is the way it is and it’s not going to change. The first match here was very different to Vienna as well.”
Ugo Carabelli was attempting to become the third Argentine to defeat Zverev this season, but instead has now lost all ten meetings with players ranked in the top 20.
