'PLAYERS LOOKED AT ME DIFFERENTLY': SINNER REFLECTS ON AO, DENIES FAVOURITISM

Jannik Sinner was able to ignore public scrutiny and retain his Australian Open crown. (Getty/Clive Brunskill)

Successfully defending the Australian Open title should translate into unbridled euphoria, but for Jannik Sinner, he contemplated giving up tennis altogether.

The 23-year-old northern Italian has tolerated a barrage of criticism and negative attention following two positive doping tests at Indian Wells over 12 months ago, with the case taking months to settle.

Eventually, Sinner was slapped with a three-month ban after testing positive for one billionth of a gram of an anabolic steroid from a massage, preventing him from missing any Grand Slam tournaments, much to the displeasure of players and fans due to double standards.

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Earlier this week, Australia's Max Purcell accepted an 18-month suspension due to exceeding an IV infusion limit of 100ml, despite the Prohibited Method not being listed on WADA's banned substances and not classified as performance-enhancing.

Former world No.33 John Millman told the Sydney Morning Herald: "When Sinner receives a three-month suspension for a banned substance, and Max is given six times the penalty he received, it's hard not to think that the system has failed its players."

In a recent interview with Italian broadcaster RAI, Sinner proclaimed his innocence.

"I've been criticised for supposedly being treated differently (to other players who tested positive), but it's not true," he said.

"I've had to go to a lot of hearings, and they've probably tested me more than others.

"I don't want to respond to criticism, people are free to say what they want and judge people. What matters to me is that I know what I've been through; it was difficult, and I wouldn't wish anyone to go through that as an innocent person."

The world No.1 has captured the past three Grand Slams contested on hard courts, but what makes his previous two major wins impressive is having to block the outside noise.

During his time at Melbourne Park in January, he shared that it wasn't easy to be recognised as a different person.

"I remember before the Australian Open this year, I was at a not very happy place. In Australia, I didn't really feel comfortable in the locker room or at the restaurants, the players looked at me differently, and I really didn't like it," Sinner confessed.

"There, I thought that living tennis that way was really heavy: I've always been someone who took tennis 'jokingly', I thought about taking some time off after Australia.

"Then it went as it went, I didn't want it to go like this, but in the other sense, at that moment it did me good."

Sinner will appear at the Rome Masters 1000 next week in the build-up to the French Open.

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