World No.3 Alexander Zverev admitted there is a gulf between Jannik Sinner and everyone else on the tour. Zverev suffered a 1-6, 2-6 loss against the Italian in the Mutua Madrid Open final. Siner has beaten the German in semi-finals at ATP Masters 1000 events in Paris, Indian Wells, Miami, and Monte-Carlo.

On Sunday, the World No.1 continued his domination as he extended his head-to-head record against Zverev to 10-4. Sinner has won the last nine matches against Zverev on the tour.

“He’s very good, of course. But I think today I would have lost to anybody, to be very fair. I think today I played an awful tennis match,” Zverev said after Sinner triumphed 6-1, 6-2.

Zverev admitted he failed to bring his best to the court and thus didn’t talk about strategy.

“I think everybody’s struggling against him,” Zverev said of Sinner. “He’s won the last five Masters events, so it’s not like I’m the only one losing to him. I’m just losing to him more because I get to him every single time and I lose to him. So, it’s like that. Today doesn’t make sense to talk much about strategy, it was absolutely a terrible match by me. I don’t think there’s much strategy involved.”

The German praised Sinner for bringing high level of tennis on the court and not going through a dip in form.

“I think he’s very stable,” Zverev said. “He doesn’t have dips, he doesn’t have phases where he goes down. I think that’s why he’s world No. 1. To me, that’s more spectacular, I think, keeping the level the whole time.

“I think there’s a big gap between Sinner and everybody else right now. It’s quite simple. I think there’s a big gap between Sinner and everybody else. And I think there’s a big gap between Alcaraz, myself, maybe Novak, and everybody else. I think there are two gaps right now. It’s difficult to say that there’s not a gap between Sinner and everybody else if he hasn’t lost a match in Masters events since Shanghai.”

Zverev will next take part in the Italian Open.