For the second straight year, Novak Djokovic is one win away from his first Roland Garros title and the career Grand Slam. In 2015 it was Stan Wawrinka who denied the world No. 1. Now it is familiar foe Andy Murray who will stand in Djokovic’s way on Sunday.
Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray will be facing each other for the seventh time in a major final when they battle for the French Open title on Sunday afternoon.
Overall, they have squared off on 33 previous occasions, with Djokovic leading the head-to-head series 23-10. The Serb had been 12-1 in their last 13 encounters prior to last month’s Rome championship, but Murray ended the skid by pulling off a 6-3, 6-3 upset. Despite that setback, Djokovic is still 4-1 lifetime against Murray on clay and shortly before their Rome showdown he beat the Scot 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 in the Madrid final. In their six Grand Slam title matches, Djokovic is 4-2 (4-0 at the Australian Open, 0-1 at both Wimbledon and the U.S. Open).
Murray had never previously advanced this far at Roland Garros, in part because he ran into the world No. 1 in last year’s semifinals. The underdog put up an impressive fight, but Djokovic prevailed 6-3, 6-3, 5-7, 5-7, 6-1 before falling to Stan Wawrinka two days later. On the other side of the draw this time around as the second seed, Murray has turned in his best-ever performance on the red dirt of Paris thanks to victories over Radek Stepanek, Mathias Bourgue, Ivo Karlovic, John Isner, Richard Gasquet, and Stan Wawrinka. The two-time major champion needed five sets to get past both Stepanek and Bourgue, but he surrendered only two sets combined in his next four matches.
Djokovic has run into no such trouble en route to his fourth French Open final appearance. The top seed ensured that another chapter in this rivalry would be written after he disposed of Yen-Hsun Lu, Steve Darcis, Aljaz Bedene, Roberto Bautista Agut, Tomas Berdych, and Dominic Thiem while surrendering only one set to Bautista Agut in the process. Djokovic is now 43-3 for his 2016 campaign, which includes five winner’s trophies.
“Now I put myself in a position in which I wanted to be in of course ever since last year’s final,” Djokovic explained. “I was hoping that the clay-court season would be successful in the other tournaments, but mostly in this one. It’s always high on the priority list when I start a season thinking about Roland Garros, and to be able to reach [the final] is really special. I give myself another opportunity to win the trophy.”
“It’s obviously a very big match for both of us,” Murray assured, “(with) Novak trying to win the career slam it’s obviously a huge match for him, and me trying to win my first French Open, as well. Neither of us know how many more chances we’ll have to win here. It took Roger (Federer) a long time to win this one. And Novak, too. It’s a very tough event to win.
“There is a lot riding on the match for both of us. I hope we can both play a good match. We have had some really big battles in the slams before on all surfaces. I’m sure it will be the same again on Sunday.”
Tactically, of course, there are no secrets between these familiar foes. Especially on this surface, they will be content to match strength with strength and slug it out in grueling baseline exchanges. Djokovic, as usual, will look to punish Murray’s second serves as arguably the best returner in the sport–something Wawrinka failed to do on Friday. As for the pressure, the 11-time major champion has been dealing with that since the start of the fortnight and it ratcheted it up when Rafael Nadal withdrew more than a week ago–making Djokovic an even heavier favorite. That added weight has hardly slowed Djokovic down and there is no reason to think it will suddenly affect him in this one. The second time should be the charm.
Pick: Djokovic in 4
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I have to give my heartiest congratulations to Djokovic for completing the Nole slam. He richly deserves all the plaudits he’s getting from all and sundry.
Many thanks, for all the welcomes, looking forward to some great conversations on tennis, huge Rafa fan, with Andy as my second favorite, but have great admiration for what Federers done, and what Novak completed yesterday, hope Rafa can make a come back at some point ….
And huge congrats to Nole and fans for what he achieved yesterday, only the third man in history to do the 4 in a row, wow amazing ….
hi alison, nice to see you here! hope we get to chat some time soon…
Sure even @pseudoFed gets it…
RT @PseudoFed: Lots of staff members looking for jobs this morning after asking me how I felt about @DjokerNole getting the #NovakSlam – #NowHiring
Thankyou Amy, im sure we will ….
i saw that your second favourite was andy alison….were you upset he lost? was fine for me as i like both rafa and nole, although rafa is my fave.
i think andy could win wimby…
wow it says it all when itv’s catch up for the french open final has a picture of rafa on it!!!! not either nole or andy – this is a british site afterall..
And yet someone here is posting that it’s the Federazzi media ignoring Nole when it’s not really the case.
except that it is.
Didn’t say they were ignoring Nole (just his achievement that fed nor any other player other than Laver could do in the open era).
BTW countless players and coaches DID recognize this achievement, just not the federazzi biased media CLING to Roger desparately LOL.
That is what I’m saying.
They are not mentioning it because even Rafa has not been able to achieve what Nole has achieved.
Must be the media with Rafa-tainted glasses! LOL!
Amy yeah a bit gutted, dont dislike Novak, im just not a fan, respect his achievements though, and what he did yesterday was amazing, will always root for Murray, and would love to see him get another GS, especially a Wimbledon title unless hes playing Rafa lol ….
I was bullied on TX by 3 posters clubbing together, i mentioned to Sean about the moderation, and everytime i did it fell on deaf ears anyway, he didnt seem to care, or want to do anything about it, ce la vie, anyway i do generally like that site, and get on with most posters, and have had many great discussions, so i cant complain about that ….
Yes, and I emailed Sean about it and requested posts be deleted — to no avail. And my own issues there — Deaf ears, again. Hawkeye is right — it depends who you flag. It worked late last summer or maybe it was early fall. I complained about an attack on a respected Nole fan poster and the personal insult posts were immediately deleted. Offending poster left, too. But Zero response to the offenders these past months. Also requested a Rafa fan be taken off permanent moderation considering the inconsistency of fairness. No response or action.
So… moving on… Delpo and Dimitrov match on grass in Germany right now. Delpo serving for the match… And gets it! Have you found the WTA page here? Very excited to see Belinda Bencic back from injury – she won her match but it was shaky at times.