NEW YORK — The best player in the world spent a portion of Thursday at a training facility in Europe, photographing his own return to court practice, and uploading the image to Instagram during the week of the US Open.
Jannik Sinner’s caption was shorter than the silence that preceded it. “Missing the US Open this year is tough,” the world No. 1 wrote. “I was looking forward to being back… For now, back to recovery and working to come back stronger.” He added that New York has “a special place in my heart.” It was the first image he had shown of himself on court since defeating Alexander Zverev in straight sets at Wimbledon on July 13 — a match, and a fortnight, that looks, from where he sits now, like both the summit of his year and the point at which it stopped.
The fans who found the post wrote the same thing in different registers. “Tennis needs you,” read hundreds of comments in half a dozen languages, the kind of convergent response the algorithm does not manufacture — it finds its way there because it is true. The 2026 US Open, which began August 30 at Flushing Meadows, is a different event without the man who entered late summer 44-3 with six titles, including five straight ATP Masters 1000 events and a fifth Grand Slam championship to his name.
The withdrawal announcement had come on August 21, through a statement posted to his social media accounts. “Even though I have been working hard with my team and my medical staff, we have now had to make the difficult decision that I will not be able to compete at the US Open this year,” Sinner wrote. He had been working on court in Monte Carlo in the days beforehand and concluded — he and his team together — that more time was required. The injury at the root of it: extra-articular tendinous inflammation in his right knee, meaning inflammation of the tissues surrounding the joint rather than inside it. A structural injury. A recovery that cannot be rushed by force of will.
The trouble had surfaced in the weeks following Wimbledon. Sinner skipped the National Bank Open in Montreal and then the Western & Southern Open in Cincinnati, two hardcourt tune-up events that typically set a player’s timing ahead of the US Open. By the time the calendar reached mid-August and players began filing into New York, Sinner remained in Europe with his medical team, not yet cleared for the two weeks of five-set hardcourt tennis a Grand Slam demands. The withdrawal made him the first of 14 players to exit the draw before the tournament began.
It is the first Grand Slam he has missed since the 2019 US Open, when he made his major debut and lost in the first round. In the years between that match and this one, he built something remarkable: a record at majors that put him alongside the best players the sport has produced. His Wimbledon title defense in July — a 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 dismissal of Zverev that dropped no sets across the fortnight — was the clearest demonstration yet of what he has become: a player who performs with identical precision on clay, grass, and hard court, who does not have a surface that breaks him down.
The US Open that opened without him belongs structurally to a different bracket. Zverev, runner-up at Wimbledon, advanced to the top seed in Sinner’s absence. Carlos Alcaraz returned to Arthur Ashe for the first time since a wrist injury ended his season in April, testing the repaired joint against competitive hardcourt in early rounds. Novak Djokovic, 39, opened his campaign chasing a 25th Grand Slam in the most genuinely open draw the men’s event has produced in years. None of these stories began with the premise that Sinner would be absent. They all adapted to it.
What the September 3 post tells the sport, beyond the fact of continued recovery, is that Sinner is still oriented toward return. His team’s stated plan was to remain in Europe through the US Open’s fortnight, continue rehabilitation, and aim for the Asian swing in late September and early October — the China Open in Beijing and the Shanghai Masters. No specific return date was given. No specific commitment made.
That calibrated vagueness is not avoidance of the question. It is the correct answer to a question that medicine has not yet resolved. Extra-articular tendinous inflammation responds to time and load management, not to deadlines, and Sinner’s team would not confirm a return window that the knee has not yet confirmed.
What remains unanswered, as the US Open plays toward its second week without him, is whether the version of Sinner who dominated the spring — winning Monte-Carlo, Madrid, Rome, his grass-court preparation, and then Wimbledon itself — can be recovered intact on the other side of the injury. Yahoo Sports reported that his camp has expressed optimism about the Asia swing timeline. Optimism is the correct professional posture. Whether the knee concurs is what the practice courts in September will establish.
For now, the world No. 1 is training in Europe, watching a tournament that would have been his. The fans in his comments are right: the event misses him in the way it misses a structural presence. The game is not the same without the player who has been its clearest argument for the last two years.
He knows. He said so.
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