Comply with stay protection of Day 7 on the 2024 US Open
NEW YORK — It was one of the best of instances, it was the worst of instances.
Twenty-six days after Novak Djokovic received Olympic gold in Paris, he completed off his second-least worthwhile Grand Slam season since 2009 with a shocking third-round defeat to Alexei Popyrin on the U.S. Open. With a number of months remaining on the 2024 tennis calendar, he may finish the yr with no Tour-level title for the primary time since 2005, whereas concurrently securing what he describes because the “biggest achievement of his profession”.
When has it ever been a case of both/or for Djokovic? The 24-time main winner is mostly solely happy when he’s successful all the pieces. Settling for something much less has usually been anathema to the person who has dominated tennis, with a blip or two, because the begin of 2011.
Because it so usually goes on this sport, father time is undefeated. At 37 , maybe the second that was all the time coming has lastly arrived. Not in a steep decline, nor an finish to his relevance at Grand Slam tournaments. Simply his changing into a participant that may nonetheless hit the heights every so often, however not on a regular basis and never all season lengthy.
Gamers who’ve crushed him embrace Alejandro Tabilo, Tomas Machac, Luca Nardi, and now Popyrin. His defeats on the majors to his two largest rivals, Jannik Sinner in Australia and Carlos Alcaraz at Wimbledon, had been each desperately one-sided. That Djokovic reached that Wimbledon ultimate simply six weeks after surgical procedure on the medial meniscus of his proper knee is testomony to the truth that he can nonetheless be a power at Grand Slams. That Alcaraz lower him down so simply in that ultimate is testomony to the sensation that his defeats now, after so lengthy, have the capability to develop into ugly in a short time.
Novak Djokovic left New York with no Grand Slam title to his identify this yr. (Angela Weiss / AFP through Getty Photographs)
It occurred in opposition to Popyrin, in entrance of 24,000 on Arthur Ashe. Djokovic has been in restoration for months, slowly upping his bodily exertion, and in that point, his sport has essentially suffered. His ball-striking and tactical nous are nonetheless there, and he has even added a turbo increase when he wants it, most memorably ripping two forehands previous Alcaraz within the second-set tiebreak on the Olympics.
His ideas after his defeat to Popyrin didn’t account for any of that.
“I’ve performed a number of the worst tennis I’ve ever performed, actually, serving by far the worst ever,” Djokovic instructed reporters in a brief post-match press convention as Friday night time ticked into Saturday morning.
Ever since he returned from surgical procedure, his service movement has been ungainly, particulary on the follow-through. He has regarded unsteady as he lands, usually stumbling into the court docket. However the ball has nonetheless gone within the field. Not so throughout this match, the place he made 52 % of his first serves, in opposition to a profession common within the mid-60s. He hit 32 double faults in 38 service video games throughout three rounds.
He additionally acknowledged that it had been tough coming right here so quickly after the excessive of the Olympics, and that he wasn’t actually in the appropriate state to compete. “I spent a variety of vitality successful the gold, and I did arrive to New York simply not feeling recent mentally and bodily,” he stated.
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“However as a result of it’s the U.S. Open, I gave it a shot and I attempted my finest.”
All of that is completely comprehensible — it’s simply, that is Djokovic. Apart from the 2016 to 2018 comedown after he accomplished the profession Grand Slam, what’s been so exceptional about him is his capability to all the time go once more, whilst he’s ticked monumental achievement after monumental achievement off his listing.
That wasn’t the case in opposition to Popyrin. He regarded lifeless, struggling to awaken himself in the way in which he usually does, and he was strikingly quiet — barely making a sound as he struck the ball — even in moments of excessive exertion and stress. The group play was half-hearted. The tight video games invariably went in opposition to him, reasonably than for him. The acquainted first-set rope-a-dope that turns right into a dominant four-set win by no means got here.
Within the third set and the early a part of the fourth, when Popyrin was collapsing into serves, lacking and lambasting himself, it regarded as if the inevitable was coming. However it wasn’t the inevitable of the final 20 years that arrived. It was the inevitable of the final eight months.
Alexei Popyrin overcame a wobble halfway via the match to grab management within the fourth set. (Sarah Stier / Getty Photographs)
As his Grand Slam season ends, the exceptional achievement of successful Olympic gold more and more appears to be like like a shiny distraction, in analytical phrases. Nothing can diminish the size of doing that at 37, not least Djokovic’s response as he collapsed to the clay and shook with tears, but it surely has nonetheless been a fairly disappointing yr for him. There are mitigating circumstances — not simply Djokovic’s knee, however being struck on the top by a metallic water bottle in Rome — which have made attaining his ordinary heights much more difficult.
He will probably be again for the Australian Open, determined to wrestle the title he has received 10 instances again from Jannik Sinner, however what occurred on Friday wasn’t a blip. It was not an earth-shattering end result, like when he misplaced to Sam Querrey at Wimbledon in 2016, which turned the tennis world the wrong way up. Dropping to Popyrin, who ran him shut at this yr’s Australian Open and at Wimbledon too, was in line with lots of his defeats this yr.
Profitable in Paris was the outlier, and whereas a Grand Slam ultimate; semifinal; and quarterfinal is a yr that the huge, overwhelming majority of gamers would retire on at any age, that isn’t how Djokovic thinks. Till 2024, he had received a significant title yearly since 2010, however for 2017.
“Sitting from a bigger perspective, in fact I’ve to be content material,” Djokovic stated when requested to take a longer-term view himself. Seeing whether or not Djokovic has the power to reset his objectives within the subsequent yr or so, and whether or not he’s completely satisfied to take action, will probably be one of many defining tales in tennis in 2025.
(Prime picture: Sarah Stier / Getty Photographs)
