His record of 10 Grand Slam wins since turning 30 is frankly unreal, and being prevented from playing in Australia and the United States last year only seems to have heightened his hunger for the big prizes.
Viewed in isolation or devoid of context, Novak Djokovic’s reaction on winning the Australian Open for the tenth time might have seemed over the top or even bizarre. After all, this was no breakthrough win, or a comeback from a potentially career-ending injury. Djokovic had won the last Grand Slam he played, and four of the last six he had participated in.
Scratch beneath the surface though, and the outpouring of emotion – which included slumping down in tears in the box that seated his entourage, and sobbing into his towel when he got back to his court-side chair – was perfectly understandable. This was Grand Slam No:22, equalling Rafael Nadal, but anyone with an iota of fairness will acknowledge how that tally could have been higher but for the controversies that have shadowed Djokovic ever since the Covid -19 pandemic began.
Deported from Australia on the eve of the 2022 Australian Open, Djokovic was treated with less respect than many white-collar criminals are. Later in the year, he couldn’t even travel to the US Open because of his (non-vaccinated) status. This is not a space in which to argue about the legitimacy or otherwise of vaccine mandates, but it should be pointed out that several other high-profile sportspersons have shared Djokovic’s misgivings about being jabbed.
Unlike most other vaccines, which undergo years of clinical trials before being used, the various Covid vaccines were rushed through in an effort to control the pandemic. No one yet knows the long-term impact they could have, and they certainly haven’t prevented millions of those jabbed from contracting the virus.
Djokovic has long said that he’s extra careful about what he puts into his body. After all, this is a man who transformed his career by completing changing his diet and lifestyle in his mid-20s. For any athlete, the body is everything. And there are enough cautionary tales – like Jean-Pierre Adams, the French football international who died in September 2021 after spending 39 years in a coma following a botched operation – to make the likes of Djokovic and Kyrie Irving, the NBA basketball star, extra suspicious of a rushed-through vaccine.
Sporting events have no option but to follow the laws of the land in which they’re played, so there can be no criticism of the US Open organisers for Djokovic being unable to play the 2022 event. But Australia deserves the strongest possible condemnation for the manner in which he was treated last January. Had the policy been clear, Djokovic wouldn’t even have travelled to Melbourne.
But you don’t invite someone into your country – and that too one of the greatest athletes of all time – and then humiliate him by subjecting him to extradition. If there was an error in the paperwork, it could have been sorted out tactfully behind the scenes, instead of politicians and officials playing to the social media gallery.
If Djokovic felt hurt and slighted, he had every right to be. What you saw after the final point was won against Stefanos Tsitsipas was a year’s worth of frustration and pent-up emotion pouring out. Remember too that Djokovic had won eight of the 11 previous Australian Opens before he was forced to sit out the 2022 tournament. And that Nadal, who won in his absence, hadn’t triumphed there since 2009.
Recall too that Djokovic has reached the final of the US Open nine times, winning it thrice. Carlos Alcaraz was a deserving winner in New York last autumn, but it was the first time he had ever gone past the quarterfinals at a Grand Slam. It’s only natural to wonder how he might have fared against the man whose mental strength is second to none.
Djokovic is also slowly making a mockery of the history books and every notion we have about aging. In 13 calendar years since he beat Andy Murray at Melbourne Park in January 2011, Djokovic has only once finished a year without a Grand Slam title. That was in 2017, the year he turned 30, when an elbow injury that necessitated surgery kept him from reaching even a semifinal.
Since then, Djokovic has played in 18 Grand Slams, winning ten of them. To put that astonishing achievement into perspective, consider this. That’s just one fewer title than Rod Laver and Bjorn Borg, two of the greatest to play the sport, managed across their entire careers. Pete Sampras won only one of his 14 Grand Slams after he turned 30. Of Roger Federer’s haul of 20, just four came after he entered his 30s. Nadal comes closest to Djokovic in the Peter Pan stakes, having won eight titles since entering his fourth decade.
But what makes Djokovic’s record all the more remarkable is his excellence on every surface. That haul of ten Slams since 2018 includes at least one title at each tournament. In contrast, Federer last won the US Open in 2008, and didn’t reach the final in Paris after 2011, which was also the year in which Nadal last made a Wimbledon final.
When Nick Kyrgios, who missed the Australian Open through injury, tweeted that Djokovic could end up with as many as 28 Grand Slam titles, he was only half-joking. For Kyrgios, Alcaraz, Tsitsipas, Daniil Medvedev and every other pretender, the fear is very real. Djokovic is relentless, there are next to no weaknesses in his game, and there is absolutely no sign of his hunger abating. If anything, the Covid-related absences seem to have sharpened it.
Federer may have been the most graceful and elegant player to step on to a tennis court, while Nadal – who has come back from some horrific injuries – is surely the gutsiest. But as time goes by, Djokovic is building a very strong, watertight, case to be considered the greatest there’s ever been. Let’s not conflate that with his views on vaccines or the questionable antics of his father.
This was supposed to be the next generation’s time, as age and niggles caught up with the three men who have defined tennis in the 21st century. Federer has eased into retirement, and as the injuries mount, Nadal may soon follow. But Djokovic? As we saw in Melbourne, he remains a force of nature, with a point to prove. In the weeks and months ahead, he’ll take some stopping. Kyrgios’s prediction of 28 Slams may be a touch on the high side, but Margaret Court’s all-time record of 24 is very much in his sights.