Novak Djokovic and Kevin Anderson will be squaring off for the seventh time in their careers when they battle for the Wimbledon title on Sunday afternoon.
Djokovic is leading the head-to-head series 5-1, including 1-0 at the All-England Club. That’s where they last met, with a 2015 fourth-round showdown going the way of the Serb–who battled back from a two-set deficit to prevail 6-7(6), 6-7(6), 6-1, 6-4, 7-5 on his eventual way to the title. He has won five in a row at Anderson’s expense since losing a three-setter 10 years ago at the Miami Masters.
Win or lose, this fortnight has put an exclamation point on Djokovic’s resurgence following a period of inactivity and an injury-plagued slump. The world No. 21 set the table for it by showing tons of improvement during the clay-court swing, with a semifinal showing in Rome and a quarterfinal performance at the French Open. He finished runner-up to Marin Cilic at Queen’s Club before maintaining his fine grass-court form through five mostly routine Wimbledon matches against Tennys Sandgren, Horacio Zeballos, Kyle Edmund, Karen Khachanov, and Kei Nishikori. Djokovic then took his comeback to new heights by outlasting Rafael Nadal 6-4, 3-6, 7-6(9), 3-6, 10-8 in a semifinal thriller played on both Friday and Saturday.
The 12-time major champion may not have a full tank of gas for the final, but it’s safe to say that Anderson is also running low on energy. Not only did he famously survive John Isner 7-6(6), 6-7(5), 6-7(9), 6-4, 26-24 in the second-longest match in tournament history on Friday, but he also preceded that result by stunning Roger Federer 2-6, 6-7(5), 7-5, 6-4, 13-11 in the quarterfinals. Anderson has also advanced in SW19 with more straightforward defeats of Norbert Gombos, Andreas Seppi, Philipp Kohlschreiber, and Gael Monfils.
This is a nightmare matchup for Anderson, because Djokovic arguably wields the best service return in the game. Nadal probably would have been the 6’8” South African’s preferred opponent, because even though the Spaniard’s baseline game is every bit as good as Djokovic’s, his return of serve is not in the same ballpark. Thus Anderson would have had an easier time inducing short returns out of Nadal and dictating play on a more consistent basis.
And when Nadal is a more favorable matchup, that’s not a good thing for Anderson. After all, he got trounced by the world No. 1 in his only previous Grand Slam final at last summer’s U.S. Open. Another rough day for Anderson could be in the cards against a former world No. 1 who has won this event three times.
Pick: Djokovic in 3
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I don’t think Djoko will suroay Nadal’s slam count. He’ll probably win 2-3 more slams. O more. He will play well, but wil be stopped often by younger generation. We’ll comment about that in a couple of years.
After Fedal and Djokovic retire, I’m expecting for a lucky GOAT analysis.
I only just read some of the comments higher up thread today. Some of those by lucky could have been written by Nole fans or those who hate and seek to demean him . She even said rafa had agreed with the roof being closed when we all know he was unhappy about it! How on earth does PAscal Maria refusing to water the court in the fifth set of RG equal them playing the entire match ie all five sets of it indoors! There is no comparison! It’s especially unfortunate to bring up that fifth set at Rg imo. Cheryl said she still believed that if they had played the match outdoors Rafa would have won in 4…I agree and I also think that if they had opened the roof on Saturday he would have won it and much more quickly as well.
I don’t normally read tennis x but I had a look at it today and it’s full of gloating Nole fans with silly names. They are using the watering the court in the fifth set at Rg as well…I wonder if they are repeating what they read here!!!
Amy, if Rafa disagreed on the spot, you think they would still insist on having the roof closed? The rule is such that both players have to agree, if not why do you think Djoko had the right to decide? On what basis he got to decide?? If Rafa was unhappy and voiced out that he disagreed, then perhaps they would let the match continue with the roof open. I doubt Rafa and Djoko would argue or quarrel over it.
They (Rafa and Djoko) should voice out their unhappiness over not being able to start their match earlier, perhaps on another court which then play would be outdoors when there’s daylight and no rain.
The Djoko fans, if they want to gloat, let them gloat, it’s not the first time that they gloat. The same could be said of the Fed and the Rafa fans too, may not be at this site but at others.
Lucky rafa did say he wanted the roof open and Nole said he wanted it closed. Because they started with the roof closed they allowed Nole ‘s decision to override rafa’s!
This was all explained out in the open by the BBC with Becker chortling away saying ‘of course Novak wants the roof open because he knows it gives him the advantage.’
Rafa had no choice but to go along and he said afterwards that wimby was an outdoor tournament and they should have opened the roof on Saturday!
Apparently playing under the hot midday sun was like being in a greenhouse with high humidity!
I meant to say ‘ of course Novak wants the roof closed!’
Ok Amy, if that’s the case it’s not Rafa’s fault for not voicing out. It’s too bad that Wimbledon made such a stupid rule but the most frustrating part is that they didn’t allow their SF to start on Court 1 when everyone could see that the Anderson/Isner match was going to last for almost forever!
If they really started at Court 1, Rafa would most likely won in four sets before darkness set in. I can understand why the frustration over Djoko’s decision, and he’s doing that to maximize his chances of winning, perhaps even desperately wanting to win.
I think the players, or Rafa himself should call for such a stupid rule to be changed. I’d argued with Joe or someone else about having the match in indoor conditions in bright daylight and sunshine and how uncomfortable it would be for everyone – the spectators and the players. Even with air conditioning, it’s not enough to cut out the heat and humidity (greenhouse effect).
Like I said, everything worked in Djoko’s favor this Wimbledon – the Isner/Anderson match took so long that Rafa/Djoko had to play in indoor environment; Anderson being too tired to fight in the final after his long SF; the stupid Wimbledon rule, both Fed/Rafa getting tough QF opponents, that Fed was eliminated unexpectedly (and I would think Fed need not take 6+ hours to finish off Isner had Fed reached the SF and so Rafa/Djoko would get to play in daylight and outdoors on CC) etc all played into Djoko’s hands and he gladly took the chances to win the title.
I meant to post this on the nadal Djokovic thread! I meant the comments further up thread there!
Rafa and Djoker agreed to play indoors after a long SF. I am wondering if one of the players disagreed at that time , would they have played indoors ?
I don’t think they were given any choice about it!
Then they should have decided on their own for the next day as well. Why take Djoker’s preference ? If a match under sun can be played under roof under specific conditions why not vice-versa.
Anyway they did not finish the match on Friday, what the hell Wimbledon was trying to achieve. Its high time players start boycotting such major which is played under stupid traditions and they have to bow it Duke of kent everytime who had been a drugist all his life. I would rather have players bow to a Brtish Bulldog than a drugist.
they had no choice on Day 1
To end the GOAT debate, if GOAT can be decided on slam count only, and given how fiercely Rafa-Fed match was fought in AO 2017 and also this Wimby semi-finals between Rafa-Djoker, and lot of close matches beforehand as well, one has to say that GOAT debate is a matter of few points over these 3 guys career !
This itself proves that they all are of the same class and there does not exist any GOAT. GOAT should never be decided by handful of points and that too over 3 players 15 year careers.
Good point. In a direct encounter someone get 1 slam and the other player 0. But their class is about the same level. Think about the Big 3 slam matches that were decided on a couple of points. A GOAT has to be clearly the best one. And in this case, there is too little to separate them.
I wonder if we attribute 1 point to every QF slam phase, 2 points for the SF, 3 points the runner and 5 to the winner, how would that look like for Big 3? I should do that when I have time. Because the slam count doesn’t tell the whole story. Look at Murray…how many finals he lost to Djoko.
Any idea how many five-setters Murray has lost to Djoker, Fed and Rafa. How many of those were even close ? I believe Murray has featured in lot of finals but most of them have been one sided, part from a couple maybe.
Just count how many QFs, SFs, Fs and Ws they made. Clearly Fed has the most points as he has played for at least three to four years more. He has played in 73 slams by now, vs Rafa’s 53 and Djoko’s 54.
Fed made 30 finals winning 20; Rafa made 24 finals winning 17; Djoko made 22 finals winning 13. Got to check the no.of SFs and QFs made.
Eugene, I think if you did that method, then Federer would naturally come out on top just on the fact that he’s played many more majors than the other guys. So it’s not really a fair way to do it.
However, you could wait until all the Big 3 or 4 have retired, and then do it?
And I’m glad you said what you said above. It’s what I’ve been chirping about on here for a couple years now- that arguments can be made for all 3 of them being the “greatest”, whatever that even means. A better way to put it is that I find there to be just too much reasonable doubt that any one of the 3 are definitively greater than the other 2. All 3 of them have legitimate reasons why they shouldn’t be considered all around greater than the other 2.
I’m not too naive to think that people don’t desperately want their favorite player to not be considered “not-as-great” as the other two guys, and that it’s fun to have these kinds of debates. It’s just that, in this case, it’s just so goddamn subjective and they are so goddamn close, for their own very different and unique reasons. And when it comes down to splitting hairs, or in this case splitting atoms, I just don’t see how one of them can objectively be declared as being greater than the others. There’s just too many variables.
Again, the fans of a given all-time great player are almost ALWAYS going to say they believe their player is the greatest, or at least not worse than the other two- that’s just the way it works. But it’s when the tennis establishment, or even the ATP itself, starts calling someone the GOAT, I really don’t like that….
Eugene, this site does something like that but is much more comprehensive. That’s the reason I always link to it:
http://www.ultimatetennisstatistics.com/goatList
Of course Kevin, we can draw a line only after the big 3 retire and all their achievements are considered carefully. However, I doubt that even then someone will be able to prove that
‘any one of the 3 are definitively greater than the other 2’.