MELBOURNE, Australia — Novak Djokovic won some of his 24 Grand Slam tournaments without playing his best tennis. When his level was not at the required level, his body stepped up to outsmart and outwit his opponents.
Before becoming Novak Djokovic, the current record holder for men’s Grand Slam titles and the longest-running member of the ‘Big Three’, he was in a very different situation. Although his level was comparable to Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, his body continued to let him down.
He retired against Nadal at the 2006 French Open. He did the same thing a year later in the Wimbledon semi-finals against the same opponent. His illness was so notorious that before the 2008 US Open quarterfinals, Andy Roddick made a mocking attack on him, suggesting that some of his injuries weren’t real.
Roddick listed the following illnesses: “Bird flu… anthrax. Sars. When asked about Djokovic’s injuries, he replied, common cough and cold.” Federer also criticized Djokovic for retiring against Roddick at the 2009 Australian Open, saying, “This has happened before. He’s not a guy who never gives up, so it’s a bit disappointing to see that.” spoke.
Sixteen years later, Djokovic, now 37, appears to have come full circle. His level is there, but his body is declining.
At the Australian Open on Friday, Djokovic, who had been suffering from physical problems, was able to maintain a close battle with world No. 2 Alexander Zverev for 81 minutes in the semi-finals, but lost a tough first set. It was only when he missed a sitter volley at the top. The net was down 5-6 in the tiebreak. Djokovic quickly retired, shaking Zverev’s hand and waving to the crowd as he left the court.
Djokovic also managed to defeat reigning French Open and Wimbledon champion Carlos Alcaraz in the quarterfinals on Tuesday, despite suffering a muscle tear in his left foot late in the first set. The same issue forced him to retire against Zverev, and not just the miracle of Tuesday’s victory, but the gap between playing on adrenaline and painkillers and actually recovering from an acute muscle injury. highlighted.
He pulled off a similar miracle at Roland Garros last June, defeating Francisco Cerundro in five sets despite tearing the medial meniscus in his right knee midway through the match. He underwent surgery after the tournament and reached the Wimbledon final less than six weeks later.
Neither miracle had a happy ending. He withdrew from the French Open before his next match against Casper Ruud. At Wimbledon, Carlos Alcaraz used his limited movement to blast him off the court and win 6-2, 6-2, 7-6 (4), with the scoreboard flattering Djokovic.
Those results account for three of Djokovic’s last four Grand Slams, including two retirements and one injury-induced thrashing. He also suffered a shocking loss to Alexei Popyrin at the 2024 US Open, where his flexibility and durability were more fleeting than fundamental.
Djokovic is currently stuck in a catch-22. He has the level to win the four five-set majors he actually cares about, but he doesn’t have the physicality to win the three-set events that make up the bulk of the ATP Tour. I hardly care. It’s a cruel coda, especially here in Melbourne, for someone who has become accustomed to putting on almost unbelievable Houdini performances, winning titles in 2021 and 2023 by muscle.
This time, Novak Djokovic’s body could not sustain him in the Grand Slam semifinals. (Yuichi Yamazaki/AFP via Getty Images)
Djokovic also has two legitimate rivals who can outdo him on court in Jannik Sinner and Alcaraz. Both men beat him in Grand Slam matches last year, then Djokovic defeated Alcaraz in straight sets (2) in the Olympic gold medal match and then again on Tuesday.
In individual matches, especially matches of three sets or more, he is still comparable to both. However, Grand Slams are not about individual victories. These are exercises in accumulation and endurance, in which the player must defeat one, sometimes two or three of his strongest rivals, while trying not to expend too much energy to get the chance.
Throughout his career, Djokovic has mastered the art of winning the first four rounds of majors with as little trouble as possible, and he has the greatest index of Grand Slam pace the sport has ever seen. It is. At the 2019 Australian Open, he lost two games to Kei Nishikori in the quarterfinals, but was forced to retire in the second set, before defeating Lucas Pouille by four games to advance to the final. A year later, when the 2020 final reached the fifth set, it was Djokovic, not Dominic Thiem, who was able to dig deep and find something special.
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Five years later, time has brought about the inevitable, and Djokovic, who built his career on one of the ultimate tests of endurance in men’s tennis, is limping out of the majors. In a press conference after his retirement against Zverev, he admitted that “the statistics are against him” regarding the frequency of his recent injuries.
“Now I don’t go into every Grand Slam and worry about getting injured,” he said. “It’s true that (I’ve) been injured quite a bit over the last few years. I don’t know the exact reason for that. There’s probably a few different factors.”
The most obvious factor is his age. The endurance of Serena Williams, Nadal and Federer reshaped what meant the end of their tennis careers, but even Djokovic’s superhuman peers had stopped him from winning a major at his current age. . Federer won his last tournament in 2018 at the age of 36. Nadal won the 2022 French Open two days after he turned the same age, but he won with a completely paralyzed leg and has been far from active in majors since then. Andy Murray, Djokovic’s coach here in Melbourne, won the last of his three majors at the age of 29 and made his final second-week appearance just after turning 30.
“If your body doesn’t react the way you want it to, that’s unfortunate,” Murray told a small group of reporters on Friday.
Nevertheless, Djokovic is not finished.
“I’m going to keep trying to win more slams, and as long as I feel like going through all of this, I’ll be around,” he said.
If the first and last chapters of Djokovic’s career turn out to be symmetrical, his career will be remembered for the 13 years and record-breaking number of majors that intervened. At the time, his physical, mental, or otherworldly talents compensated for temporary deficiencies. .
He finds himself held back by his own physique, and the future of his quest for even bigger titles in the sport is more uncertain than ever.
(Top photo: Andy Cheung/Getty Images)
