Jannik Sinner and his coaches — Simone Vagnozzi and Darren Cahill — haven't found a place in the ATP year-end award nominations for 2024. Reacting to this, Serena Williams' ex-coach Rennae Stubbs and Andrea Petkovic have expressed their opinions. Stubbs and Petkovic discussed the issue in the latest episode of The Rennae Stubbs Tennis Podcast.
The ATP recently declared the nominees for the Stefan Edberg Sportsmanship Award and Coach of the Year award. In the first category, Carlos Alcaraz, Casper Ruud, Grigor Dimitrov and Dominic Thiem are in contention.
While talking to Rennae Stubbs in the aforementioned episode, Andrea Petkovic read through the nominations for the Coach of the Year Award, expressing surprise at Sinner's coach Darren Cahill's exclusion.
At this, Stubbs, who coached Serena Williams through the 2022 US Open, highlighted Simone Vagnozzi being ignored as well.
"Coach of the Year nominees, Xavier Malisse from Alexei Popyrin, Emmanuel Planque from Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard, Michael Russell from Taylor Fritz, Brad Stine from Tommy Paul, James Trotman Jack Draper… No Darren Cahill," Petkovic said (at 12:21).
"Or the Italian guy," Stubbs remarked.
"Or yeah, Simone Vagnozzi," Petkovic added.
"That’s pretty crazy," Stubbs noted.
Petkovic, the former WTA No. 9 then opined that the ATP might have made a conscious decision on not having Sinner and his staff members in the race for any awards due to the ongoing trial in the Indian Wells doping case against the World No. 1.
"It’s because if he [Jannik Sinner] gets banned, they don’t want him to be on the list," Petkovic said.
"Also because we haven’t had that final say from WADA," Stubbs chimed in.
"I think they’re basically, I don’t know if protecting is the right word, but let’s say just protecting themselves from a situation that he has the Sportsmanship award and Darren has the Coach of the Year award and then he gets banned for a couple of months," the German continued.
"Listen, if you’re gonna let him play and you’re gonna allow Darren to coach, then why are you leaving them off that list? That’s ridiculous. I mean I can see it in a weird way but not really," the Australian added.
"I think it’s just self-protection. They don’t want to have to explain anything... They want to just protect themselves from a PR disaster that the guy that has Sportsmanship award gets banned for doping," Petkovic stated.
Rennae Stubbs wants Jannik Sinner among the nominees for the ATP awards in 2025
In the same episode of The Rennae Stubbs Podcast, host Rennae Stubbs expressed her desire to see Jannik Sinner among the nominees for the ATP's sportsmanship award in the next season.
"If he [Jannik Sinner] doesn’t get banned and plays and next year he does get to the end of the year, he should be on the Sportsmanship award. I mean, honestly, the guy doesn’t say a peep on the court, he’s the most well-mannered, well-behaved human being I’ve seen possibly," Stubbs said (at 13:49).
At this, Andrea Petkovic hilariously mentioned a mild blowup from Jannik Sinner during the Cincinnati Masters in August 2024, when he clinched his second Masters 1000 title of the year.
"He kicked the wall in Cincinnati, very gently, in a fit of rage. That was like the biggest emotional outburst," Petkovic said laughing.
Sinner has enjoyed unprecedented success in 2024, winning eight singles titles, including the Australian Open and US Open, and helped Italy to a second successive Davis Cup title. He ended the season with a 73-6 win-loss record.