The Australians were unlucky to come across an in-form Jannik Sinner on Sunday and it was his 6-3 6-0 victory over Alex De Minaur that gave Italy their first title in 47 years and returned the double superfluous. De Minaur also featured in last year’s defeat to Canada in the final at the same arena and the world number 12 took comfort in seeing how well Australia had performed since the format of the final was changed to a best-of-three-set match. “There hasn’t been another nation that has made back-to-back finals in the last two years, so we had a very good collective effort,” he told reporters. “We are very, very close to the goal and it sucks a lot, but like I said last year in the same situation, we will come back. We’ll get there. I mean we have a very, very strong future ahead of us.” Australia won the last of their 28 titles in 2003 and reached the last two finals without the talented Nick Kyrgios, who is currently sidelined by injury and who last played the Davis Cup in 2019. Captain Lleyton Hewitt forged strong links between De Minaur, Alexei Popyrin (40th in the world) and Jordan Thompson (55th), as well as between Matthew Ebden and Max Purcell in doubles.De Minaur admitted he was outclassed by world number four Sinner in the second singles match, after Popyrin was beaten by Matteo Arnaldi in the opening match. “Jannik is riding this incredible wave of confidence… the level he displays is truly impressive,” he added. “I’m going to find ways to improve myself to be able to hurt these types of players. Today I didn’t have enough. “I’m disappointed that I couldn’t give the boys a chance to play the doubles, that’s probably the biggest disappointment.”