The Grandstand‘s Top 10 Matches of the Year list continues with No. 3, a Nitto ATP Finals round-robin showdown between Dominic Thiem and Novak Djokovic.
Before the year-end championship leaves London in 2021, this penultimate event it gave us perhaps the best match in O2 Arena history.
Novak Djokovic may not have played his absolute best, but he never had a chance to do so with the way Dominic Thiem was bludgeoning the ball throughout their round-robin battle. Thiem blasted 51 winners over the course of two hours and 47 minutes, eventually triumphing 6-7(5), 6-3, 7-6(5). The Austrian twice gave back breaks in the third set but eventually recovered from a 4-1 deficit in the ensuing tiebreaker to finally seal the deal.
It gave him back-to-back wins over Roger Federer and Djokovic, as the red-hot Thiem had previously kicked off the week with a straight-set defeat of Federer.
Djokovic was effusive in his praise of Thiem during a post-match press conference.
“He just played very courageous tennis; just smacking the ball,” the Serb explained. “He went for broke…. I don’t think I have experienced too many matches like this where my opponent just goes for every single shot. I mean, he was unbelievable. In some stages it was just incredible that he was just literally smacking the ball as hard as he can and he was going in. His level was super high. This today was unbelievable. As I said, he was taking every opportunity to smack the ball as hard as he can….
“It was amazing. I have played him before, I know his game, but what he did tonight was just out of ordinary. I know that he can play in a high level, but tonight was just phenomenal.”
“Probably it was maybe the best match I ever played,” Thiem agreed. “It was a real classic; (an) epic match which will happen from time to time at these big tournaments. It had everything what a match like this needs. He was up. I was up. He was playing amazing points. Me, I was playing amazing points. And then I think the match deserved an end in the third-set tiebreak.
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