Why Italian tennis star Jannik Sinner speaks German as his first language

Jannik Sinner helped Italy win a second consecutive Davis Cup title in Málaga, Spain toward the end of 2024, but the 2025 US Open finalist, whose mother tongue is German, has been frequently questioned about whether he “feels Italian” in his home country.

The reason German is Jannik Sinner’s mother tongue

The 23-year-old hails from South Tyrol, a German-speaking autonomous province in northern Italy which shares a border with Austria. As a result of the mountainous terrain Sinner grew up in, he initially excelled in skiing, becoming one of Italy’s top junior skiers between the ages of seven and 12, despite not sharing a first language with the vast majority of his peers.

In February 2024, shortly after he had won his first Grand Slam at the Australian Open, Sinner was asked about his identity in an interview with Vanity Fair Italia. He had previously received criticism in Italy for choosing not to represent the country in the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, and for sitting out the first of their two Davis Cup victories in 2023.

Sinner discusses Italian roots

“Always, and I’m very proud of it,” Sinner responded when asked whether he saw himself as Italian, and how it made him feel. “When I was 7 I took part in ski championships with Italian kids, when I was 14 in Liguria (training at the Piatti Tennis Center) my classmates were Italian.”

The world No.1 was also keen to point out that Italians from South Tyrol were no different to those from other parts of the country where local dialects, rather than Italian, prevail: “We speak our German dialect, but even in Sicily they speak a dialect that in other parts of Italy they don’t understand, right?”

The first Italian No. 1 in men’s tennis

Thanks to his victory in Australia in January 2024, Sinner became the first men’s Italian Grand Slam champion in 48 years and only the second ever in the Open Era after Adriano Panatta, who won the French Open in 1976. Five months later, he became the first Italian in history to top the men’s world ranking, where he has remained ever since.

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