Australian Open 2024: The talented Mr Djokovic

Djoker racing against Commonwealth Games medallist Peter Bol. Novak Djokovic's 89-8 win-loss record at the Australian Open makes him the strong favourite for a fifth Australian title in six years and for a 25th Grand Slam title overall. (Photo via X/@AustralianOpen)

There was Novak Djokovic doing a leg stretch with Australian artistic gymnast Georgia Godwin in Melbourne, leading her through the social media challenge he had thrown some time back. He was also serving to former cricket captain Steve Smith, who managed to return the serve much to everyone’s amusement. The Serbian batted with a cricket bat, missed the ball, and then swapped it with a tennis racquet, with which he could send the ball into the stands. He dunked a basketball with NBA star Alan Williams and raced Commonwealth Games medallist Peter Bol. Playing mixed doubles with Aryna Sabalenka, he stood at the net and wriggled his backside, which had her in splits.

“What a beautiful view I have,” she said, giggling on the microphone.

A challenge?! This is like shelling peas for international gymnast Georgia Godwin, @DjokerNole!#AusOpen • #AO2024 pic.twitter.com/bXs24p8Lfj

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— #AusOpen (@AustralianOpen) January 11, 2024

At the charity event with stars from other sporting disciplines, Djokovic still owned the court, the player formerly known as “Djoker”, performing with confidence, humour and playing to the galleries. This is the stadium, the tournament and the country that has given him some of his most consistent successes—and one great embarrassment.

There are some sumptuous statistics in addition to the ones already well known about Djokovic. For instance, he has not lost a match at the Australian Open since January 2018, when he was beaten in the pre-quarter-finals by Hyeon Chung. He won three straight titles, from 2019 to 2021, before missing the 2022 edition (in which he was not allowed to play) due to his stand against the COVID vaccine. He put aside that humiliation, won the title again last year, tying with Rafael Nadal on 22, before adding two more Slams in 2023 to take his total to 24.

During this unbeaten streak in Melbourne, he has won 28 straight matches—in fact, he had won 43 straight matches in Australia before Alex de Minaur beat him in the United Cup last week, though Djokovic was troubled by a right wrist injury. His 89-8 win-loss record at the Australian Open makes him the strong favourite for a fifth title in six years and for a 25th Grand Slam title that will take him past Margaret Court and make him the owner of most major singles titles across men and women.

At 36, it might theoretically seem that Djokovic should be nearing his sell-by date, considering his nearest opponents—Carlos Alcaraz (20), Jannik Sinner (22) and Holger Rune (20)—are so much younger. Even the slightly older ones, like last year’s finalist Stefanos Tsitsipas (25), Daniil Medvedev (27) and Alexander Zverev (26), have a decade’s youth over him.

But Djokovic has always maintained that he is hungry for more, and that desire has made him chase goals relentlessly. The Athletic recently used ball and player tracking data developed by British company TennisViz and Tennis Data Innovations—a joint venture of the ATP Tour and ATP Media—to analyse how Djokovic’s game has changed over the years and become better.

“In numerical terms, the changes may seem, on the surface, to be incremental, but in a sport that turns on a handful of points in each match, seemingly small changes can result in big differences. Remember, Djokovic has won 14 of his 24 Grand Slam titles since 2015,” Matthew Futterman wrote in The Athletic last week.

Djokovic’s first serve averaged 120.1 miles per hour in 2023 versus 115.4 in 2015. The ATP tour average rose from 116.1mph to 116.7, debunking any advantage due to racquet technology or lighter balls. Last season, Djokovic’s conversion rate (a player’s ability to win points from an attacking position) was 72.1 percent, higher than his conversion rate of 68.8 percent in 2015. The tour average is 66 percent. His forehand became two miles per hour faster over the past eight years, according to some of the data pulled out by The Athletic.

Djokovic clearly wants to keep going and realises that to beat the competition, he has to keep getting better than he already is. He relishes beating the younger players—evident from some of the digs he takes at players’ ages in post-match conversations—wants to win some more Slams, the Olympics this year and the Davis Cup for Serbia.

“It's not a secret that I want to break more records and make more history of the game. That’s something that keeps on motivating me,” the Australian Open website reported Djokovic as saying earlier this year.

All great players adapt, to become more efficient, to compensate for their ageing legs and slower speed. Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal did it too, but Djokovic’s ability to adapt transcends their efforts, a scientific, calculated and unflinching push to remain at the top of the sport.

“It’s the only way, to be honest. I enjoy playing tennis, don’t get me wrong,” ausopen.com reported him as saying. “When it comes to professional tennis competition, leaving my family to travel somewhere for four, five, six weeks, eventually for me there’s only one direction or one goal that is in my mind, which is winning the trophy. I do everything possible to achieve that.”

Djokovic is the first man to win three majors in a year in four different years, 2011, 2015, 2021 and 2023. He still has to win all in a year, to emulate Rod Laver who was the last male player to do it in 1969. Add that to his still growing list of pending achievements.