MELBOURNE – If tennis awarded points for smiles as well as winners and errors, Jannik Sinner, Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic would be in serious trouble. The big contender for the number one spot would be from Argentina and his name would be Mariano Navone. In open competition with Alcaraz, of course.
‘Tennis makes me smile,’ said Navone during an interview with CLAY in Melbourne, where he played the Australian Open.
In a sport that is very frequently all about tension and long faces, the joy with which Navone approaches his job is refreshing.
At the age of 23 and number 47 in the ranking, the Argentinean leapt to the forefront of tennis in the first months of 2024 with an impressive rush of success in challenger tournaments that led him to a small record: he was, at Roland Garros 2024, the first tennis player in history to debut in Grand Slam tournaments entering directly as one of the pre-qualifiers, as one of the 32 favourites.
Today, now established on the ATP’s top tour, Navone enjoys every detail, every new development. And he backs Italy’s Jannik Sinner, although he warns that the anti-doping system works ‘strangely’.
– There are a lot of long faces in tennis, why do you laugh, how do you manage it?
– It’s like everything else, there are times to suffer, there are times when it’s a bit harder and there are times when it’s easier. But at the end of the day, it’s a game. We dedicate a lot of hours to it professionally, we dedicate many hours a day to it. And it’s true that at the time I wasn’t quite ready for things that happened to me, like lifting the crowd in a stadium with a point won. Every time I go into a stadium I get goose bumps, because the people are welcoming you, because they are applauding you, they are chanting your name. It’s very special, especially in South American tournaments. I get very fond of the people and that aspect of the game brings a smile to my face.
– So you are not used to it, you don’t take things for granted, you still have the ability to enjoy, to see, to notice what’s going on around you.
– I think tennis is a bubble, at this level I think it’s an elite bubble. For people who consume tennis at home and can’t come to these tournaments, we are living the dream of many. We are the privileged ones who have the possibility to be here and who also made the effort to get here. But obviously we are very, very privileged to have what we have. And I take advantage of it to enjoy it, I don’t keep it to myself. By enjoying it, I don’t respect anyone more or less. And you have to enjoy it for some things that sometimes tennis has that are a bit more fucked up.
– What are those things?
– In the first round in Australia I lost a great match against Jack Draper. I played four hours, I had a thousand break points to win it. I ended up cramping up, having a bad moment of tension, very frustrated. And a couple of days later I had the luxury of having fun and enjoying a double. Tennis is about reinventing yourself all the time. I want it to be like that, that’s why having fun doesn’t mean I stop respecting anyone.
– Have you ever experienced a situation where you were told that you were enjoying yourself too much?
– At the beginning I was watching, absorbing and enjoying everything. And in the end I had to get used to it, but there are a lot of people who pay tickets to come and see us, and I think that’s crazy, that there are people who have the time to go and see you just like you hit a ball. I think it’s unbelievable…

– You mentioned the tennis bubble, what is this bubble, what does it mean?
– You know what happens? There’s something good about the bubble, that we’re all the same. That’s great, in the locker room, in the changing room, we’re all the same. We talk to the people who look after the locker room, the ones who change the towels, the ones who do the massages? You are with the elite of the tennis world, the elite in economic terms and in terms of fame, but after that we are all normal, we all greet each other. That’s what the bubble is, because then you go outside and you have 400 people following you to ask for a photo. For example, Alcaraz. Inside the dressing room he’s super normal, but when he goes outside people want to eat him alive. That’s what the bubble is: inside they are normal, outside they are stars.
– You are going to make your Davis Cup debut against Norway in Norway, what do you expect from that?
– I’m very happy, it’s another chance to enjoy and go with the team. I earned it on the court, I think I did great merits to be there. And on the hard court I’m playing better and better. I’m going for what I have to do: if I have to go to applaud my team-mates so that they win and help them train so that they are perfect to play, that’s perfect. And if I go to play I will try to win as much as I can. I want to enjoy that experience and hopefully I can make my debut, because you want to play. But I’m also going to clap my hands if I have to clap my hands, because I don’t think we’re very local in Norway, so…
– What do you think of the innovation of placing the coaching staff almost inside the court?
– It’s good, I think tennis has to adapt. Tennis has to grow at some point in that sense. I think the coach has to be closer and closer, closer and closer, more and more in the player, I think it’s good that they don’t see from the chair, because from the chair you can’t see well. There are certain things that cover you up and you can’t see well. I think it’s good that you can talk a lot, it’s comfortable. It was something that tennis needed. Your coaches give you indications, you can solve things that you couldn’t before. And before you were put on ‘warning’ for coaching.
– How do you feel about the emergence of Joao Fonseca? Are we facing a big star?
– I think Joao has been on the horizon for a long time. He’s a guy who obviously at some point we’re going to see fighting in the big leagues, fighting with the best in the ranking. He’s a very focused, very mature kid, with an environment that takes good care of him. And that is very important, especially because he is very young. But he is above all a great player with some great shots. For South American tennis is great, because it feeds him for years.

– In 2024 you defined yourself as ‘a Formula 1’, a kind of driver with a big team around you that takes care of you. You said this months before your compatriot Franco Colapinto landed in Formula 1. Are you still a Formula 1 driver?
– Yes, my team is in every detail. My coach, Andy, my physical trainers, kinesiologists, my psychologist… There are a lot of people who contribute to the Formula 1, and what I have to do is to be behind the wheel, but they give me a lot of things so that I can compete in the best way.
– Chile’s Nicolás Jarry recently said that in his doping case he did not feel he was treated in the same way as Italy’s Jannik Sinner. What do you think?
– I know a little bit more about Jarry’s case, and the strange thing is how the system moved. It’s strange because I think similar things happened to them and the ITIA (Tennis Integrity Unit) worked in two different ways. I don’t think Jannik, considering the amount that was detected, wanted to take any supplements to take advantage. I really doubt it. Being number one in the world, everybody is going to be looking for you to have something. But it’s true that, for much less, many American players got much more serious sanctions. I think that’s what has to change. That’s why I don’t criticise Jannik, because I don’t think Jannik has done anything, because he’s a very clean player. I think that what is not working well is how justice is being done and that they don’t measure everyone with the same yardstick. There are guys who are sanctioned for the contaminated meat from Colombia and they can’t play again. So the measures are sometimes strange to say the least. So that’s the problem, the process, not Jannik himself.