Jannik Sinner’s retirement from the 2024 Paris Olympics due to tonsillitis has brought the doubles player Andrea Vavassori into the main draw of the singles as well because the time limit for the first of the excluded, namely the fifth Italian player, was exceeded.

The fifth Italian player following Sinner, Lorenzo Musetti, Luciano Darderi and Matteo Arnaldi, is Flavio Cobolli who consequently did not take part in the Paris Olympics. Flavio Cobolli’s father, Stefano himself a former tennis player, wrote about the incident in a long post on Instagram, while taking a jab at Sinner himself.

“Many individuals have written to me in the past few days about the Olympics. About why Flavio could not participate despite his top 50 status (the only one in the world to be excluded). The rules are clear: each nation can bring its best 4 singles players. Flavio was fifth, so everything is routine. Good for Italy, which is enjoying a golden period. But why didn’t Flavio enter in lieu of Sinner? Because, once again, the regulations define that if a qualifying player (in this example Sinner) cancels after July 20, at that moment an onsite participant joins in his place and not the player who follows him in the ranking.

Sinner canceled, I believe, on July 23 and so a few days after the deadline that would have allowed Flavio to take over. Again, everything is regular. I am surely not the one to analyze or fight about whether the regulations are good or incorrect; nor about why Sinner passed the deadline: he must have had his reasons. My thoughts, instead, center on Flavio. On my trip back from Umag, Flavio told me something that made me pleased, made me feel good and made me feel good: “Dad, do you know that I would have given the victory of a huge ATP tournament in exchange for participation in the Olympics? Be careful, not winning the Olympics but participating! Well, this made me extremely proud since then my family managed to pass on essential sporting ideals ​​to him,” he explained.