Sinner outclasses de Minaur in Canadian Open final

Alex de Minaur has fallen short in his bid to capture a maiden ATP Masters 1000 title, losing the Canadian Open final in straight sets to his Italian nemesis Jannik Sinner.

Seventh-seeded Sinner continued his dominance of de Minaur with a commanding 6-4 6-1 victory over the Australian No.1 on Sunday.

It was Sinner's sixth win from as many meetings with de Minaur and instead earned the 21-year-old his first ATP Masters 1000 crown after losing two Miami Open finals, in 2021 to Hubert Hurkacz and this year to Daniil Medvedev.

The 21-year-old is the youngest Canadian ATP Masters champion since Alexander Zverev won as a 20-year-old in 2017.

Sinner is also only the second Italian to win at this level since 1990, the 2019 Monte Carlo champion Fabio Fognini.

"It means a lot. It is a great result," Sinner said.

"One I can share with all the people who are close to me every day. It is a nice moment to share with them and we are doing the right things.

"This result makes us feel good, stronger and hungry to work even harder in the future."

While Sinner will climb to No.6 in the world, de Minaur's consolation is a new career-high ranking of 12th in a huge confidence booster ahead of the US Open starting in two weeks.

The 24-year-old was contesting his fourth final of the year, after claiming his seventh career title in Acapulco and losing to world No.1 Carlos Alcaraz at Queen's and to the fourth-ranked Stefanos Tsitsipas two weeks ago in the Los Cabos decider.

He had never even reached the quarter-finals at a Masters 1000 event before this week.

But the tenacious baseliner overcame seeds Cameron Norrie, Taylor Fritz and Medvedev to progress to successive finals for the first time in his career.

As well as his rankings spike, de Minaur will also soar five spots to 10th in the Race To Turin as he strives to qualify for the elite season-ending championships for a first time.

"It was a breakthrough week for me," de Minaur said.

"I had a nice week here in Toronto. I played some great tennis and it gave me a taste of it. My maiden (Masters 1000) final and I will be back."

De Minaur, though, was playing catch-up from the get go in the title match against his Toronto doubles partner .

He dropped his first service game to trail 2-0, broke back for 2-2 only to be broken again to trail 4-2.

In a pattern, de Minaur again levelled for 4-4 only to drop serve trying to stay in the bizarre set as Sinner took it in 54 minutes.

Sinner gained two more breaks in the second set to run away with the match and land the eighth trophy of his professional career.