Novak Djokovic won his 17th consecutive match and captured a second straight title on the Asian Swing by rolling over Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 6-2, 6-4 in the final of the Shanghai Rolex Masters on Sunday. Djokovic, whose current streak also includes titles at the U.S. Open and in Beijing, needed just one hour and 18 minutes to prevail.
Djokovic dropped serve once in the first set but more than made up for that hiccup with three victorious return games.
A more competitive second set saw Tsonga kick things off with four consecutive holds. The Frenchman, however, never had any prayer against his opponent’s serve. In fact, Tsonga won only a single point in five return games. A double-fault by the underdog on break point at 4-4, ad-out proved to be decisive.
Highlights:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2xIYR8gyv4]
“Today the key was to get as many serves back into play to Jo because he has one of the biggest serves in the game,” Djokovic assessed. “He has shown that in the second set, with some break points early in the set. He came up with some aces, some big serves.
“Generally, I felt always in control of the match. I felt like I’ve done everything right. I’ve won many of my service games very comfortably. I didn’t allow him to get into the rhythm, get into the match. Today’s match, and overall the tournament, it’s gone incredibly well for me.”
[tweet https://twitter.com/SHRolexMasters/status/655723508559798272]
The week still went extremely well for Tsonga, who prevailed in consecutive three-setters over Albert Ramos-Vinolas, Kevin Anderson, and Rafael Nadal.
“I’m very satisfied,” the runner-up assured. “To come back at your best level, it’s always a long process. I’m happy today to be back really close to the top 10. Like I said just before, it gave me energy to continue to work hard and try to achieve other good things.”
Tsonga is going to surge six spots to No. 9 in the race to the World Tour Finals. That would put him as the first alternate, which will be especially important if Andy Murray follows through with his threat to skip it and prepare for the Davis Cup final on clay in Belgium.
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JJ gets off to a flying start by breaking Thiem in the first game.
wow
And continues to do so. An upset looming on the horizon.
JJ now full of confidence and serving at a high level. Thiem continues to fight but his serve is letting him down.
5:4 ane JJ about to serve for the match.
Too good by JJ. Too many UEs from young Thiem who breaks 8,700 Austrian hearts.
Wow janowicz won. Good fight from the pole. He’s got ability to make deep run here.
hometown jitters for Thiem
True. He was overwhelmed by the crowd support whenever he was on the back foot. Hope this doesn’t impact on his confidence.
JJ has a shot to get something going on these courts. I was out for most of the day and didn’t get to see this match. It’s too bad Thiem couldn’t get it done. I will have to remember to try and stay tuned to the tennis channel. I can at least get to see the replays if the times are too crazy.
Jerzy sensed what was happening to Thiem and was able to capitilize on it. Once he had taken the TB he successfully neutralized the home crowd effect.
Novak in Serbian Press:
“I am unbeatable…If I had to come up with the tactics how to beat myself I would not know how to do it”…
This is what I call high confidence… 🙂
Also known as chutzpah………..
🙂
Cannot argue with that. Probably a lot of top 10 players are thinking the same
yep…most of them do…
No way he said that
he didnt
Sounds perfectly plausible to me. He was virtually canonised in Serbia and Mama Djokovic told the world he was the child of god (or as some claimed, THE child of God) at the AO in 2008.
source Wiki: On 28 April 2011, Patriarch Irinej of Serbia awarded Djokovic the Order of St. Sava I class, the highest decoration of the Serbian Orthodox Church, because he demonstrated love for the church, and because he provided assistance to the Serbian people, churches and monasteries of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Kosovo.
link?
did you mistranslate it or did the Serbian press mistranslate it?
Ricky, How do you know he did not say it? nats reads Serbian Press and knows the language too. So the possibilities are Djoko did say it or somebody in the Serbian press reported fake quote. Djoko and his family are perfectly capable of such statements. Fed too is capable of such statements. Rafa and Muzz are not.
Oh yes he did say this if this newspaper is to be trusted.
I only have the paper version (“INFORMER CG” is the name of the paper) and in order to get the on-line version you will have to pay some fee, which I do not want to bother doing, but you are free to do so. The date is October 20, 2015. Just need to google Informer Crna Gora -sport-tennis and you will get the link.
You all can use google translate and here are some excerpts:
The Serbian version says:
the headline is: “Srpski teniski sampion o svojoj dominaciji: NEPOBEDIV SAM!”
toliko sam dobar da ni sam sebe ne bih mogao da pobedim…
Novak Djokovic kaze da ne bi znao koju taktiku da primeni kad bi za protivnika imao svog dvojnika. On ima 14.245 bodova na ATP listi, sto je apsolutni rekord.
and the translation is:
“Serbian tennis as on his domination: I AM UNBEATABLE!
I am that good that I would not be able to beat myself’…
Novak Djokovic states that he would not know which tactics to implement if he was to face himself. He owns 14.245 ATP points which is the absolute record”.
the first paragraph of the article reads: Prvak sveta Novak Djokovic smatra da je nepobediv! On je svestan da je trenutno toliko dobar pa u sali kaze da ni sam sebe ne bi mogao da savlada!
translation: The World No1 considers himself unbeatable. He is aware of how good he is at the moment and joked that he would not even be able to defeat himself”.
and then the article quotes Greg Rusedski statement on Novak:
Novaku nedostaje samo Roland Garos da bude najveci teniser svih vremena. Sada od njega ocekujemo da osvoji sva cetiri grend slema u jednoj godini I to u 2016.
translation: Novak is missing only RG title to become the greatest tennis player of all time. Now we expect him to win all four Grand Slams in one year and that in 2016.
Novak also speaks about not being worried about defending a lot of points next year. he just wants to enjoy the season and there is no room for concern. The whole team is proud of his accomplishments and once the next year comes he will start thinking of that subject. Also concern about defending the points is ancient history for him. it is not what preoccupies him because he enters each tourney to win the trophy, not to defend it..
I can even take a photo of the whole article if you wish and will post it here so that you can do the translation yourself and make your own judgements…
sorry for the typo…it should read “Serbian tennis CHAMPION”…
@ augustina 9:49 am,
so true… 🙂
what’s so true? cant see a 9.57am comment
meant @ 9.49am
ed (at 10:20 am & 10:21 am),
Scroll up (30 posts or so).
well, we will just have to agree that we already show support to different youngsters and will continue to follow tennis in the future maybe because of them?
it would be fun to see all of us here in 4 or more years time, once our favorite players retired, arguing about our new favorite players like Thiem, Kyrgios (call me crazy but I will cheer for him IF he gets his head fixed 🙂 ), Kokkinakis, Zverev…as far as I can see Rafa fan base will be cheering for different players in the future… 🙂
natashao2013 says:
October 21, 2015 at 11:54 am
“…….as far as I can see Rafa fan base will be cheering for different players in the future… :-)”
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Highly unlikely in my case. I’ll probably take up fishing in the Balearic Islands. 🙂
PS
Just responding to nats post. Anyway this thread has become all things to all men.
I’ll count myself lucky if I’m still here four years from now and not in an old people’s home 🙁
Age is a matter of mind over matter, if you don’t mind it doesn’t matter. You don’t sound like you are going anywhere soon. 🙂
No one can replace Rafa, simple as that.
Lucky,
That is exactly what I was going to say. There will never be anyone like Rafa for me ever. That’s why I just try to stay in the moment. I don’t want to think about the time when Rafa will retire. I cannot imagine not being able to watch him play anymore.
It remains to be seen if I will continue watching tennis. I have watched this sport all my life. I almost gave it up after Borg walked away. But I did continue to watch. I did stop for about two years when Fed was dominating between 2005 and 2007. It was too boring. But then I heard everyone talking about this great Spanish player and decided to watch the 2007 Wimbledon. I have never looked back.
I can see myself watching, but not as often when Rafa is no longer playing. It won’t be the same.
This thread has gone off piste, it’s time it’s retired before someone complains about Rafael Nadal infiltration.
exactly…
@lucky 2:29,
saying that Kyrgios has no tennis brain is really harsh thing to say and I think he proved you wrong already by beating both Fed and Wawa and I certainly hope he proves you wrong soon again (I just wish it does not happen at Rafa’s expense) And saying that Rafa was not in good form at that time is also not accurate: he had just won the RG title over the current No1 and his biggest rival and was full of confidence so your story does not stand…
BTW the discussion here was about who of those youngsters will be able to challenge the top 4 SOON? So we are talking about the near future hence my comment about Nick…your comments about long run may stand or may not but they are irrelevant for this discussion…Nick did get big scalps at the age of 20 (which Thiem didn’t) and that is the whole point…by the age of 22 who knows what else he will be able to accomplish…those will be long two years… 🙂
natashao2013 says:
October 22, 2015 at 10:33 am
—And saying that Rafa was not in good form at that time is also not accurate: he had just won the RG title…—
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Rafa injured his back in January (during the warm-up of the AO final) and he was suffering from that injury (facet syndrome) all year round.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CR6m1JJUsAALApA.png:medium
yes dear, but the point is that he managed to beat Novak and to be able to do it you must be 100%, don’t you think?
natashao2013 ( at 10:53 am),
The point is: tennis balls have a lower bounce on grass courts than on clay and it forces a player to bend lower to return a shot.
Augusta is right, Rafa had to go four sets at each of his first few round matches at Wimbledon last year; he also struggled through his FO final match. To say he’s full of confidence is a bit stretching it.
In fact, after his AO final when he injured his back, he was never the same again. I mean how did Andujar suddenly raised his level so high that he almost beat Rafa on clay at Rio. When did Rafa become so error prone that he was hitting so many UEs against Ferrer at MC and lost; and to make things worse, lost to Almagro for the first time on clay, at Barcelona? And Almagro went on to lose to Giraldo next!
I feel Rafa’s 2014 FO title was the toughest for him at the FO so far. Rafa had the misfortune of meeting some big serving and big hitting guys at the Wimbledon last year – Klizan followed by Rosol and finally Kygrios.
Kygrios lost to Murray time and again; unless hes beating the top guys regularly, I’m not going to bet that he’ll threaten the top guys any time soon. Like I said, he’s so hit and miss so sometimes he hits it and that doesnt surprise me but many times he misses it. He was atrocious vs Gasquet at Wimbledon this year, he’s too inconsistent and it seems it all depends on his mood.
@ augusta08,
that would be a very good excuse if Rafa lost to a top 10 player…but to lose to Nick in the round of 16 when Nick was ranked 144 it takes two: Rafa to be less than 100% (which is possible due to the back issues as you state) but also for Nick to be rather GOOD…that is all I am saying…bear in mind that Rafa beat three players before he lost to Kyrgios: Klizan, Rosol and Kukushkin (all in four sets though)….but that was not bad at all…
The back issue was an excuse when Rafa lost to top 10 player but not when he lost to a 144 player? What logic is that?
because Rafa was able to beat three players and he would have done the same with Kyrgios if Nick was not good enough…his back issue (not that terrible obviously since he was able to beat Novak) would have stopped him at the more challenging matches and that is what happened…Kyrgios had belief and held it together…you can go on forever about Rafa being injured etc. but the fact is that you all (including myself TBH) fear when Rafa faces Kyrgios…simple as that…
Rafa wasn’t injured but his back was already not in tip top condition. I was thinking back then during Wimbledon that if Rafa was going four sets each match, he was not going to last, and true enough he lost in R4. I also thought that had it be Raonic that Rafa met, Rafa might also lose that match. Was Kygrios playing any better than Rosol in 2012 to beat Rafa? Rafa was just too vulnerable at Wimbledon these days. Rafa might be playing better in 2014 than in 2012/2013 at Wimbledon but that didn’t change the fact that he’s vulnerable.
So what if Kygrios has belief? That doesn’t change the fact that he’s hit and miss. He was still losing to Murray or Gasquet or Stan. I believe that on surfaces other than grass, Rafa can and will beat Kygrios.
I agree that Kygrios is hit and miss. If not for the win against Rafa at Wimbledon, who would even know or care about him besides Aussies? Unfortunately, Krygios is now known for his big mouth! That comment he made to Stan is the thing that he may well be remembered for and not his tennis.
Back issue of Rafa in 2014 is a fact. So how is nats claiming Rafa was at 100% at FO or that he must have been 100% at Wimbly? Even assuming that Rafa winning FO proved he was 100%, how does it prove he must have been 100% when he lost to Kyrgios? Back had started bothering him from Canada in 2013 and became more serious in AO 2014. I suspect it is because of the back issue that Rafa started exerting more force through his wrist to power his shots which led to his wrist injury in later part of 2014. In the off season Rafa’s team must have realized Rafa needed to change something if his career was not to end so he is trying to play differently. But unlike the changes they made in 2006 when Rafa’s foot injury threatened to end his career, this time Rafa couldn’t adapt as fast because of his age and the fact that he has been playing for so many years that it was hard for his brain to unlearn the old patterns. Can Rafa recover his lethal forehand? Unless he is able to do this, I doubt that Rafa can beat Djoko or Muzz. Rafa can at best be a top 10 player if he cannot have a killer shot. Can he develop a less vulnerable serve?The ease with which he gets broken makes me sometimes wonder whether I am watching ATP or WTA. In any case the Rafa of old is gone. Whether a new invincible Rafa will emerge, we have to wait and see.
Mary says:
October 22, 2015 at 1:11 pm
—Rafa started exerting more force through his wrist to power his shots which led to his wrist injury in later part of 2014—
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Rafa injured his (right) wrist during a practice session in Mallorca in July.
yeah, you can also claim that Rafa’s game had deteriorated in the last couple of years thus his vulnerability at Wimbly,… in any way with or without back problems Nick unfortunately was able to take advantage of Rafa’s disadvantages…and so did many this year…
But I am one of those who believe that Rafa will be back to at least near 100% and that if healthy he is set to make some good results in 2016…