Carlos Alcaraz out-Djokovic'd Djokovic to lift the Wimbledon 2023 trophy

When the Wimbledon 2023 final started, the 20-year old Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz was the future of tennis. Nearly 5 hours later, he had become the present. (Photo: AP)

For a while now, I have firmly believed that Novak Djokovic has a switch in his head. He turns it on just before the clutch points that enables him to find the perfect angle, the perfect serve, or the perfect volley when it matters the most. He gets a kick out of winning matches he isn’t supposed to. That’s his thing.

I watched the Wimbledon final on Sunday night at a sports bar with three of my friends. Even when Djokovic was a match point down, a friend of mine looked at me and said, “He can turn it around from here too. You never know with this guy.” He sure could. We Federer-fans have learnt it the hard way.

Djokovic is a good player when things seem smooth. He is a great player while facing a formidable challenge. But he elevates himself into a genius when he is backed up against the wall.

Sunday night, though, was different. When the final started, the 20-year old Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz was the future of tennis. Five hours later, he had become the present. He managed to reach where few men have. He found an answer to the switch in Djokovic’s head.

Look at the break points stat for both players. Over an epic final that lasted nearly five hours, Alcaraz had 19 break points, out of which he converted five. That is largely the case with Djokovic’s opponents.

But Djokovic could only convert five of the 15 break points that came his way. That conversion rate is normally higher, and more often than not, the difference between him and his opponent. On Sunday night, Alcaraz had the mental fortitude to do exactly what Djokovic has done over the years: raise his level while defending break points.

To borrow from George Orwell, all break points are critical but some are more critical than the others. In the second game of the fifth set, Djokovic had one to set up the championship. He was all over Alcaraz throughout that point. He had even caught Alcaraz on the wrong foot, driving a forehand to his left while his body weight moved to the right. Against anybody else, it would have been a clear winner.

But Alcaraz is young and he is swift. He threw his racquet and manufactured a return. It forced Djokovic to play one extra shot that he volleyed into the net. The break point was saved.

Djokovic lives to seize these moments. But Alcaraz kept denying them to him.

In the fifth set, Alcaraz at 5-3, serving for the championship. There is nothing more underrated in tennis than the challenge of serving out a Grand Slam final. Alcaraz found himself at 0-15 down after the first point. Djokovic started out the second point in control. When Alcaraz played an audacious drop shot, he comfortably covered the ground and challenged Alcaraz for a difficult passing shot under immense pressure.

But Alcaraz had ice running through his veins. He lobbed the ball over Djokovic’s head – one of the cheekiest shots in the book, and what a time to pull it off. The first set seemed like distant history.

Djokovic had raced to a 5-0 lead in the first set, making Alcaraz look like a fish out of water. The second was a proper bullfight. Both had a break of serve heading into the tie-break, where Djokovic had a 3-0 lead in a matter of minutes.

Alcaraz clawed his way back but Djokovic had a set point that he missed through an unforced error. He is human after all. Moments later, it was Alcaraz with a set point on Djokovic’s serve to make it one set all. He had been there, done that. History said that Djokovic would land the perfect serve. On big points, in crunch moments, the lines seem to find him, not the other way around.

But history can also be rewritten. Djokovic served out towards the backhand of Alcaraz, and he returned it with a beautifully placed passing shot to make it one set all. He got one chance to square things up. And he grabbed it with both hands.

Years later, when people who didn’t watch the match read the scoreline, they are bound to scratch their heads in confusion and wonder if there is a typing mistake. The score will tell you Alcaraz won the third set 6-1. But a little column next to it will also say the set lasted for over an hour. Surely that can’t be right.

Well, you had to watch it to believe it. One game lasted 26 minutes, where Djokovic saved six break points before eventually being broken. Rohit Brijnath, writing for The Straits Times, beautifully summed it up. “Alcaraz looked alive, Djokovic looked what he rarely does. Thirty-six,” he wrote.

But here is the thing that makes Djokovic what he is. He has won everything there is to win. He has achieved everything under the sun. Even if he doesn’t lift a finger after tonight, his place in history as the greatest of all time is as secure as it can be. Yet, he played that one game in the third set like his life depended on it. He made a man 16 years younger than him earn every point.

Over the past 15 years, Djokovic has played nine Wimbledon finals against seven different opponents, and produced some of the best tennis in the history of the game. But all that the centre court ever wanted out of him was a defeat. In almost every final, if not all, the crowd has cheered for Djokovic’s opponent. He has been heckled. He has been booed. But when he walked up to receive the runner up trophy on Sunday night, the centre court had to stand up on its feet and clap for a champion it always respected but never loved.

He was characteristically gracious in the post-match presentation. “Amazing, what quality at the end of the match,” said Djokovic of Alcaraz. “I thought I would have trouble with you only on clay and maybe on hard courts but not on grass.”

Then came the pertinent compliment. “When you had to serve it out, you came up with some big serves and big plays, so you deserve it.” It takes a clutch player to admire one.

It has been a long time since the men’s Wimbledon champion was not named Federer, Djokovic, Nadal or Murray. And the man who did it this year wasn’t even born when that began. Alcaraz’ win wasn’t just remarkable because he went toe to toe with the greatest of all time. It was remarkable because he outperformed Djokovic mentally. For all these years, Djokovic’s mental toughness has separated him from the rest. But on Sunday night, Alcaraz out-Djokovic’d Djokovic.