What Jannik Sinner told the China Open tournament director he experienced that is completely different to other events

Although the Italian is very familiar with winning silverware, Sinner admitted there was something unusual about his China Open victory.

That is not the only thing that Sinner has reportedly claimed was different about his time in Beijing.

China Open tournament director reveals what Jannik Sinner told him

The China Open has hosted both the ATP and WTA Tours over the past fortnight, with the tournament now coming to an end after Amanda Anisimova won the women’s singles title.

As a result, the organising committee for the tournament have spoken to the media and answered questions about how they think the event has gone in 2025.

One of those concerned what the player feedback for the tournament has been, with co-tournament director Lars Graff answering this question.

Graff declared that the players had responded very well to the tournament, and claimed they had said only the Grand Slams are better than the China Open.

There have been a lot of comments about the fans at the China Open this year, and Graff claimed that Sinner said he had signed the same number of autographs in Beijing as he would in six months in Europe.

Graf also revealed that the tournament had provided both Sinner and Tien with a private jet to quickly get over to Shanghai for their next tournament.

“We have got very positive feedback from the players,” Graff said in the press conference. “The players are extremely happy to come to Beijing. This year the players saw that we have the five new practice courts. We had worked with the player areas, so when the player enters the building, the Diamond Court, it’s more open, more spacious. We’re very happy with that.

“We made some improvements in the locker rooms. We built an ice bath, three for the women and two for the men. We also made locker rooms more open and more modern.

“The players, they come to Beijing and they are very surprised every year what we have done because they think that already last year was good. Now they come this year and they see we have done more things. This is not stopping this year, because next year there will be other things.

“The players are very, very happy to come to Beijing. They see the improvements. Many tournaments they come to, they don’t see the kind of improvements we do here.

“The players also see we do a lot of improvements for the spectators. The area for the spectators has been developed so it’s a better flow. The spectators can enter, they can come in. When we have almost 50,000 spectators one day, it’s very important that the spectators can move from the Diamond Court to the west plaza or maybe go to the Lotus Court without getting stuck and have to wait 10, 15 minutes. They are very happy with all the facility improvements we have done. But they are also happy with the way we treat them.

“We had meetings with ATP and the WTA, and they are giving us very good feedback. They say it’s very difficult to write a report about Beijing because we don’t know what improvements we can tell you to do.
Other tournaments, we can tell them they need to improve different areas.

“Beijing, you almost reach a state now where we can only tell you small things because everything is so good. Like the food this year, we changed the vendor for the food. The players can choose between á la carte restaurant or they have a buffet. They were very happy with that.

“After the singles final, we made the possibility for Mr. Sinner, his team, and for Learner Tien, to get the private flight from here to the next tournament, which they really appreciated. They thought that was a very good thing we did.

“The players also are very happy with the spectators because they see that there is no country in the world that has more enthusiastic spectators than China Open. The players are taking more pictures. Sinner says he takes more pictures one week in Beijing than he does for six months in Europe because everybody wants to have a picture with Sinner either privately or when he’s practicing, signing autographs.

“The crowd is very enthusiastic. The crowd is also very fair. There are other parts of the world where the crowd is always supporting the home player. In China, in Beijing especially, the crowd is very fair. Even when there is a Chinese player, they are supporting the opponent, too, which is a very good sign.

“The players are telling us basically that Beijing has reached a state now where the only tournaments that are better than Beijing is the Grand Slam tournaments. On the ATP Tour and the WTA Tour, we are on the top. The players know that, and they are very happy. As you can see, the player field is very strong.”

Full Champions list at the China Open this year

The honor roll for the 2025 China Open is now complete, with the aforementioned Anisimova continuing her breakout year by winning the title in Beijing.

Jasmine Paolini was beaten by Anisimova in the quarterfinals, but was able to bounce back to defend her doubles title with Sara Errani.

While on the men’s side of things, Sinner won the singles title, while two-time Grand Slam doubles champions Henry Patten and Harri Heliovaara continued their successful partnership in Beijing.

Going by the comments of Graf, it appears that the China Open is in a great position and that they will likely try and make more improvements ahead of the 2026 event.

Although the China Open is now over for the year, tennis still remains in Asia for both the Wuhan Open and the Shanghai Masters.