Jannik Sinner's Australian Open opponent Alex de Minaur makes feelings known ahead of QF encounter with Italian

Eighth seed Alex de Minaur is through to the Australian Open quarter-finals after beating Alex Michelsen 6-0, 7-6(5), 6-3 on Monday (January 20). The Australian has performed well so far, dropping only one set in four matches.

Now comes the biggest test for the Australian because he has to face top seed and defending champion Jannik Sinner next. Sinner has also performed really well throughout this event and he's now up to 11 wins in a row at the event. On top of just being excellent at the event, Sinner has been a massive matchup problem for de Minaur, beating him in all nine matches they have played so far.

De Minaur alluded to their head-to-head record during the post-match on-court interview following the win over Michelsen, telling Jim Courier that he's going to have to do something he's never done before, which is beating Sinner.

"Yeah, I did. It was an interesting one for sure. I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be an incredibly tough match.I'm going to have to do something that I haven't done before, but why not start here," De Minaur said on facing Sinner (3:21) onwards).

As he told Courier as well, de Minaur caught a bit of the Sinner match because it was earlier than his and it was rather interesting. Sinner mostly dominated against 13th seed Holger Rune before winning 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 6-2. But he also dealt with some physical problems, which the Australian will certainly keep an eye on.

Can Alex de Minaur beat Jannik Sinner?

Beating the Italian might be the hardest thing for the Australian to do because of a few factors. They do not match up style-wise well because the Italian plays a dominant baseline game, which de Minaur with his lack of major weapons can't easily counter.

There is also the problem of de Minaur not being able to do much behind the serve because, while decent, it's not really elite. It leaves very few ways for de Minaur to beat Sinner, and it's why their head-to-head paints such a stark picture.

Not only has the Italian dominated him that way, the matches weren’t even really close. Out of the eight tour-level matches that were actually played because one was a walkover, Sinner lost only one set, and that was years ago in 2020. In the three matches they played last year, he didn't drop a single set, which makes de Minaur acknowledging that he'll have to do something he's never done before even more important.