Forza! Italian Tennis takes Centre Stage

Written by: Abhinav Hans | February 4, 2025
tennis italy

Why is Italian tennis so good right now?

The Italian tennis structure for player development has become the epitome for all other top tennis nations. Since decades, tennis players in Italy have grown up on clay, slipping and sliding on the red dirt, learning to construct long points. Prior to 2023, the nation had only managed to produce two grand slam champions on the men’s side, both on clay. Nicola Pietrangeli winning the French Open in 1959,1960 (pre-open era) and Adriano Panatta winning the French Open in 1976 (the only player to beat Bjorn Borg at the French Open – did it twice!).

During the period 2006-2015, the Italian women were single-handedly carrying the nation’s tennis hopes. The talented woman cohort, led by the ‘dream-team’ of Sara Errani, Francesca Schiavone, Flavia Pennetta and Roberta Vinci, won the Federation Cup (now known as the Billie Jean King Cup) four times between 2006-2013 (2006, 2009, 2010, 2013). It was a landmark event in 2010, when Schiavone became the first Italian woman to win a Grand Slam singles title, beating the Australian Samantha Stosur in the Roland Garros final. Two years later, Errani also reached the French Open final in 2012, losing out to Maria Sharapova. Errani’s doubles game was even better, completing the Career Grand Slam with Vinci in 2014.

This was the golden era for Italian women’s tennis which peaked in 2015 when Pennetta beat Vinci in an all- Italian US Open women’s singles final.


Italian winning team – 2013 Federation Cup


However, Italian men’s tennis was dwindling at that time, having only two male players ranked inside the ATP top 50 – Andreas Seppi (23) and Fabio Fognini (45)* in 2012. Fognini was the only prominent name on the men’s side for a few years, making some impact in the late 2010s, even reaching a career-high ranking of 9 in 2019, the year when he also beat Rafael Nadal on clay in Monte Carlo to win his only Masters 1000.

*As per the 2012 Men’s ATP Rankings

Come 2025, Italy has recently overtaken the other two tennis powerhouses – United States and France, to have the maximum number of players ranked inside the ATP top 100. It currently has 11 players in the ATP top 100, with 7 of them in the top 50! And 5 out of the these 7 are in the age bracket of 22-23 years, which is phenomenal. While the United States might have more number of players in the top 50/top 20/top 10, up until the 2024 US Open, they have not had even a single male player making it to a grand slam final since Andy Roddick in the 2006 US Open.


This young and rising cohort of Italian male players is close-knit and have pushed each other right through the junior circuit days to reach where they are today. Matteo Arnaldi’s words in the ‘AO Show Weekly’ in December 2024, “I know basically all of them since we were like 11-12 [years of age]. It’s really nice because you get to spend all your time with them, you know them very well. When you see your friends going up, growing, winning a lot of matches, it gives you that kind of mindset where you can say like ‘if he did it, I can do it”.


As per Live PIF ATP Rankings as on 27.01.2025


At the forefront of this astronomical rise of Italian men’s tennis is Jannik Sinner, the singles world number 1 since June 2024. His all-court game, supported by his elastic movement and the ability to generate pace off both wings, has taken the world by storm. He is the first ever Italian (man or woman) world number 1 in singles and recorded one of the best tennis seasons in history in 2024, having a 92% win% (73 wins to 6 losses) and winning both hard court slams, 3 Masters 1000s and the ATP World Tour Finals in Turin (without losing a set). This also got him into the top 10 for ATP Career prize money. Sinner’s humility and down-to-earth demeanour make him even more likeable, further increasing his exponentially rising fan base.

Read more about Sinner and his racquet.


Sinner winning the ATP World Tour Finals at home in Turin in 2024


Sinner also led Italy to lift consecutive Davis Cup trophies in 2023 and 2024. Prior to this, the only other time Italy won the Davis Cup was in 1976, led by Pietrangeli, one of the most prolific players in Davis Cup history. In 2023, Sinner beat Novak Djokovic twice in the same day, in both singles and doubles to take Italy past Serbia in the semi- finals. While he may have been the protagonist, the triumphs were only possible because of a strong overall contingent, where Arnaldi and Berrettini played the crucial supporting roles in the second singles rubbers in 2023 and 2024, respectively. The doubles pair of Simone Bolelli and Andrea Vavassori, who also reached the finals of the Australian Open and Roland Garros in 2024, made the team even stronger.


Italy winning the Davis Cup Finals in 2024 in Malaga

The women have also picked up momentum after the 2010-2015 golden era, with Jasmine Paolini having a breakthrough year in 2024, reaching both the French Open and Wimbledon singles finals and rising to a career-high ranking of 4 in singles at the age of 28. She also won the Olympic Gold in doubles, forming a formidable doubles pair with Sara Errani. The pair won the WTA doubles team of the year and also led the women’s team to a triumph at the Billie Jean King Cup during the year, culminating in a clean-sweep for the Italians in the team competitions.

So what has Italy done differently?

Decentralization of the tennis structure

The pivotal change brought about by the Italian Tennis Federation (FITP) over the last 15 years has been to not separate the players from their coaches who had been with them since the beginning of their tennis-playing life. Not having to leave their homes at a very young age to travel to the national training centres far away and rather creating an environment where the players can develop their game at home with their families, friends and existing coaches around to support them, was a huge mental boost for these kids.

Funding the Ecosystem

Tennis is one of the most, if not the most, expensive sports out there. To even have a remote chance of playing professionally, you need to invest in coaches, physios, nutritionists, specialized training equipment, travel and accommodation for all the support staff, tournament entry fee etc.

For the decentralized model to work, the Federation has provided sponsorships and financial grants directly to clubs and affiliated organizations to support the youth programmes. They have equipped the coaches at private clubs with the best education materials, analytics and workshops. Scholarships are provided to young players if they reach a certain level, including funding to participate in national and international level tournaments.

The criteria of allocation of funds has linkage to the talent and potential of the player and his or her commitment towards achieving the desired results. For instance, you would need to be in top 10 of your age group to be eligible for the funding. The top 20 players would also get time off school to train and travel and to accordingly schedule their learning and examinations.

Hosting more professional tournaments

The young home-grown talent had to gain more playing experience of competing against the world’s best. To make that feasible, the FITP provided financial and technical support to all the clubs willing to host ‘Futures’ and ‘Challengers’ (competition tiers below the ATP level). Italy is now home to one of the highest number of ‘Challenger’ tournaments. The home players would often get wildcards to enter these tournaments which would also help them in saving the cost of travel and accommodation for competing in other countries. Providing this experience through easy access to top level competition at a young age has fast-tracked the development of these players.

Not to forget, Italy is already home to the prestigious Italian Open (Masters 1000), the marquee event played on clay on the beautiful courts of Foro Italico in Rome in the run up to Roland Garros.

Tennisnerd visiting the Rome Masters 1000 in 2024

‘Fast-Court’ Project in 2009

One major shift and probably one of the primary reasons for Italian success has been the commitment towards building an all-court game. “We’re trying to change the identity of our players. We’re training for modern tennis. That’s why we have players who don’t seem Italian’ in terms of their technical style,” said Filippo Volandri, Italy’s Davis Cup captain. Players like Sinner, Berrettini, Sonego, Cobolli are prime examples of playing styles modelled for the modern game, built on strong serves and forehands.

In the late 2000s, around 90% of tennis courts in Italy were clay courts. No wonder Italy was not producing more grand slam champions on the hard and grass courts. Majority (nearly two-third) of tennis in a calendar season is played on the hard courts. In order to nurture more talent on the faster surfaces, the FITP had launched the ‘Fast- Court’ project in 2009, which led to a hard-court construction boom. Italy currently has more than 3000 hard courts, a 4x increase in the last 15 years.

Pietrangeli recalled in an earlier interview that practice was almost exclusively confined to clay courts during his playing days. He said, “Back then, I would arrive in London and have one day to practice on grass. It was tough”. Now, this has changed drastically.

Increasing Popularity of the Sport

In the past, lack of sufficient broadcast of tennis matches on television was always an obstacle for promoting another sport (tennis in this case) in a country dominated by football fandom.

To increase the coverage of tennis matches in the country, the Federation launched the TV channel – ‘SuperTennis’ in 2008. The channel broadcasts not only the big tournaments but also the Challengers, ITFs, WTA tour and even some junior tournaments. This has increased the popularity of the lower-ranked players as well. Tennis is now the second-most popular sport in the country after football.

Though Sinner along with the current batch of 22-23-year-olds is now leading the charge, it was in first in 2021 when Italian men’s tennis started making real waves, when Berrettini became the first Italian grand slam singles finalist at Wimbledon since Panatta at the 1976 French Open, only losing to Novak Djokovic in the final.

The Italian players tasting success at the top level and with more access to the sport physically and on television, tennis popularity has grown exponentially in a country of less than 60 million people. As per the La Gazetta dello Sport, one of Italy’s leading sports coverage Dailies, children enrolment in Italian tennis clubs has increased by ~30% in the year 2024 itself. The number of registered club players has increased from 1.3 lakh in 2001 to 8.2 lakh in 2024, a compounded annual growth rate of 8.4%.

Italy’s success has attracted some of the most prestigious tournaments to the country. The ATP World Tour Finals have been held at Turin since 2021, and Italy has further secured the rights to host this tournament till 2030. Moreover, the Davis Cup final 8 will also be held in Italy from 2025 to 2027, which is a huge boost for the promotion of the sport.

To conclude, with the right infrastructure, funding, player-support, coaching education, hosting of world-class tournaments and increasing access to the sport, Italy has created a model which the rest of the tennis world would want to replicate in the near future. And with a once-in-a-generation talent like Jannik Sinner at the helm, we are bound to see another generation getting inspired to pick up a tennis racket.

Thanks for reading! Until next time.

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

One comment

  1. Thanks for sharing your insights; this is something that countries like Sweden should pay attention to.

Abhinav Hans

Abhinav has been following tennis for the last 20+ years and covers various topics of the ATP tour, including tournament review and player profiles.