Jannik Sinner has cast doubt over his continued participation in this year's Wimbledon Championships after struggling with an elbow issue against Grigor Dimitrov. The world No.1 was struck by the problem early in Monday's meeting on Centre Court and he was two sets down by the time Dimitrov retired with an injury of his own.

Sinner looked to be heading for an early SW19 exit, despite blitzing through his first three rounds, as Dimitrov took a two-set lead in their gripping encounter. But in the third set, the Bulgarian seemingly tweaked a muscle in his chest, and after receiving medical attention he was declared unfit to continue.

Having shared kind words of support for Dimitrov during his on-court interview, Sinner refrained from talking about the specifics of his opponent's issues during his post-match press conference, where the Italian's own problems were a hot topic of discussion.

"Tomorrow we are going to check with an MRI [scan] to see if there's something serious, and then we will try to adjust it," he explained. "It happened very early in the match, in the first game. It was quite an unfortunate fall.

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"I checked the videos a little bit, and it didn't seem to be a tough one, but I still felt it quite a lot, especially on the serve and forehand. I could feel it. So let's see. Tomorrow we are going to check to see how it is, and then we will see."

Sinner was reluctant to even think about facing prospective quarter-final opponent Ben Shelton as he wants to place his full focus on getting fit and ready to play on at the All England Club.

"I faced him last year here and it was a very, very difficult match," he said. "So, let's see what's coming, but it's going to be a problem in two days, no? Now I have to focus on other stuff first and hopefully be 100 per cent."

Sinner, 23, has three Grand Slam titles on his CV but he has never been beyond the semi-finals at Wimbledon, making it his least successful major tournament on the calendar.

It looked like the stars were aligning for him to mount a proper challenge against reigning champion Carlos Alcaraz and seven-time winner Novak Djokovic this year after a sequence of impressive performances in the early rounds. But Dimitrov was ahead 3-6 5-7 2-2 when their match was halted, with Sinner well short of his usual capabilities.