Australian Open 2026

[jimlosaltos]

Here's another take on how remarkable Djokovic's escape was, by
Martin Ingram: A data scientist at KOKNUX.

"Incredible Djokovic win! Sinner won 72.9% of his service points, Novak only 65.4% of his, so Novak's margin of victory was -7.5%. For fun, I just checked a set of Grand Slam matches since 2010. Out of 7690 matches, only five had a more extreme margin -- see pic. Crazy stuff!

filedata/fetch?id=108867&d=1769815936&type=thumb

#

[don_budge]

2026 Australian Open...ATP 2000...Melbourne, Australia (Men's semifinal's)

I'm very much our of practice. Keeping my thoughts to myself. Watching and listening. Not much happening in my assessment. Then...now. It's a trend and it permeates everything. Thinking out loud...I dare to do so. I don't care. Not a twit.

...(and have in mind Novak was spot serving very well)

Fascinating thread. Well...interesting. Ok...there isn't much to work with. Nobody cares. Do they? I did salvage this one comment. There used to be so much quoting in threads. Encouraging others to respond. It's a monopoly now. Territorial. Then...now. Spot serving? What is that?

Both men's matches basically came down to the same thing. Hold that thought. First I must give a little bit of a scathing remarks. The tennis was really low brow. One can admire the athleticism. But as far as aesthetics go or any kind of subtlety be it tactics or technique or variation of shot...it was low brow. Very little cerebral going on. Grey matter lacking. Dumbed down in so many words. I wonder how you can get so many people in one place to watch such a boring spectacle. One baseline rally after another. For over five hours. It isn't watchable. Unless you take some kind of designer drug. Just to numb it down a little. But factor in the price of admission...that is the definition of insanity.

I watched Novak play at the 2015 French Open in the quarterfinals and trust me...five or six cups of strong French roast coffee barely kept me conscious. He was in his prime then, too. Even in his prime he was the most boring number one player in the world ever. Now he is at the very end of his career and he moves around the court in between points like he needs assistance. Incidentally, Sinner has replaced Novak in the boring department. Watching paint dry or grass grow is more interesting than watching Sinner play tennis. The other side was a snooze fest as well. Unwatchable. The interview sort of consolitated the entire fiasco. Carlos Alcaraz show casing his IQ. It wasn't pretty.

Back to the tennis. Both Zverev and Djokovic were up an early break in the fifth set. Here's what it boiled down to. I know that the forum is data based nowadays. Quoting this expert and that. Well, you can watch the news all day long with the experts and get the wrong picture. Remember Al Gore and his Inconvenient Truth? Carl Sagan was on board with him as well. Both got it wrong. There were a lot of mitigating circumstances in the matches...sure there were. A lot of drama. Window dressing. But Zverev and Djokovic both were facing a similar challenge...to serve out the match. Just hold serve and get the horse is in the stable. The money in the bank.

Zverev struggled immediately. I could see the strain on his psyche. It was as if...oh no. All I have to do is hold serve. Once Novak got the break it was totally different. He had this. The swagger came back. He knew the score. He could smell the finish line. The finish line was getting farther and farther away the closer Zverev got to it. He never once thought he was going to win. Up 3-1, Zverev just couldn't hold the tempo. The service game at this point took forever and he may have saved a basket of break points. It was painful. The look etched on his face. He started to miss first serve after first serve, yet he managed to hold. It got harder and harder to the point he was serving out the match. He collapsed. Totally collapsed. He didn't have it in him in any stretch of the imagination. All of the struggling that he did holding serve to that point took its toll on his nerves. It was never even an idea for him to win that match. I was actually hoping he would. Hoping for another Alcaraz/Zverev spectacle. Another snooze fest for a Grand Slam Final. Alcarez held up his end of the bargain. His interview is a good example as to why they might just shit can the post match interviews. Nobody cares.

Which leads us to Novak. Once Novak was up a break, he does what he does best. I know nobody reads me anymore. They used to...once upon a time. But I have always said, "Novak takes care of his service game." That is exactly what he does. I ask the student..."What is power?" It's a rhetorical question...as you well know by now if you have been paying attention. Control is power. Control being the elements of speed, spin and placement and various percentage of each for each specific shot or point. Somebody on this forum thread suggested spot serving...well that is one third of it. Placement. But his various speeds and spins were keys to his placement. He doesn't over power you with speed, as Zverev mightily tried to, he uses the combination equation of the three elements. He keeps his opponent guessing. Seems to me that I wrote about serving tactics recently in one thread or another. He keeps his opponent off balance. William Tilden wrote long ago that speed alone is not the key...it is the variation of tactics. Never give your opponent the shot he wants to hit.

In comparison with Zverev, it was rather a contrast of serving efforts. Zverev was grimacing before each first serve delivery, advertising he was going to hit the serve as hard as he could. In a general vicinity. Pin point placement is down on Zverev's list of serving priorities. He started to struggle getting the first one in. Giving little Carlito a swing at the second. It's the worst thing you could do. Novak on the other hand, took the bull by the horns and thoughtfully mixed his delivery to pull Sinner this way and that. Mixing in the speed and placement on one serve and then crossing him up with subtle spin and placement. Notice I mention placement in both tactics...the other forum poster had a clue. Most interesting was the match point...he missed the first and then he served a gopher ball. A ball that begged to be hit out of the park. A fluff ball. A big and juicy fat one. Novak does this at times. It handcuffs the receiver. Daring him to try to do something outrageous. It is harder to generate tremendous speed and placement on a knuckleball. Sinner didn't do a lot with the return. Too risky. Novak is a very tactical server...sort of out of the don_budge paradigm of tactical serving.

When you compare the two service motions of Zverev and Djokovic, there are a couple of glaring differences. Number one...Novak is platform and Zverev is a convoluted pin-point. Novak very stable and methodical. Effortless. Zverev was just grimacing and trying to knock the cover off the ball. He was struggling with his rhythm. Lots of moving parts in the pin-point plus a huge windup. Unneccesary movement I might add. Keep it simple. Keep it frictionless and fluid. Novak's motion is not the prettiest...but it gets the job done. It tight situations it holds its own. He takes care of his serve down the stretch. I said it again.

I didn't watch much of either match. Maybe a bit more of Novak's. But I did watch both in the final set a bit more. The glaring difference in the approach down the stretch between Zverev and Djokovic was somewhat intriguing. Without statistics or the need to quote anyone else. I don't need a second opinion. Although I welcome comments or a difference of opinion. It used to be differnet here on the forum. You see...this is the whole point. Then...now. Roger Federer...now. Novak Djokovic has that little bit of something going in that he was part of the Roger Federer show. It says a lot about the tennis today. Novak at the end of his career in the final once again. Where is the next?

[stotty]

Alcaraz is currently the clear favourite to win tomorrow with bookmakers pricing him roughly with 74–77% chance of victory. So it will take another monumental effort from Novak as far as the bookies are concerned.

[jimlosaltos]

Alcaraz is currently the clear favourite to win tomorrow with bookmakers pricing him roughly with 74–77% chance of victory. So it will take another monumental effort from Novak as far as the bookies are concerned.

I've seen/heard a number of comments about whether Djokovic can recover. But (although I did NOT see the first semi) I understand Alcaraz threw up and got treatment for cramps. Don't know if, since it was the first match, he played in the 100 deg F heat they had earlier or what. But i'd guess Djokovic can recover in two days better than someone that was throwing up.

A couple more factoids on the two, men's semifinals that relate to that, tho

Alcaraz is 11-1 in matches lasting 3 hours 50 minutes or longer per journo Bastien Fachan while Brad Gilbert counters that Sinner is 0-9. I did not realize either.

[stotty]

A couple more factoids on the two, men's semifinals that relate to that, tho

Alcaraz is 11-1 in matches lasting 3 hours 50 minutes or longer per journo Bastien Fachan while Brad Gilbert counters that Sinner is 0-9. I did not realize either.

Yes, I heard that about Sinner. He doesn’t seem to lack fitness so perhaps it’s a mental thing. No doubt these players get to hear their own factoids so it must play on his mind too.

I believe Roger has won the most matches having been match point down…nice factoid to have.

[jimlosaltos]

Very good point from Chris Clarey about Alcaraz's tremendous success at such a young age.
The people whose records he is breaking didn't get on-court coaching while they were winning while learning on the fly.

"But it seems fair to mention that Alcaraz has done so much so young with the benefit of a tool that previous prodigies could not access: open and frequent on-court coaching. It is now legal and has certainly helped him navigate the ebbs and flows of big matches against more experienced rivals: first with Juan Carlos Ferrero as his primary coach and now, after Ferrero’s surprise exit in the offseason, with Samuel Lopez in that role."

Clary/ Substack

https://open.substack.com/pub/christopherclarey/p/alcarazs-torrid-pace?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

[jimlosaltos]

Djokovic is much more candid with his friendly Serbian press than at the open pressers. Used to be that a few tidbits would drift out much later.
But these days, with online translation so readily available we can "listen in".

One issue I completely missed in the men's final, Djokovic has always had trouble playing the wind and it was apparently windy. I didn't notice it and never heard the McEn Bros mention it.

Also, I don't know if the unspecified "health issue" is related to Djokovic's profuse sweating. It's odd that playing in 58 deg temps, early in the match, Djokovic changed his jersey, which was sopping wet.

Excerpts:

Serbian Journalist No. 2: There was a lot of wind today. Did that affect the match?

Novak Djokovic: Yes, it did. It definitely had an effect. I lost that final game while playing against the wind. I missed the first serve and then, of course, the pressure increases a bit. You feel that very strongly on the court, even though people watching on television might not see it. But it has a big impact. That’s not an excuse, neither for him nor for me.

Other things happened as well, health-related, which unfortunately affected that sudden shift in energy and the overall feeling on the court. That is what frustrated me the most and disappointed me the most out of everything.

Of course, results can go either way at this level: you can win or lose. And I am proud of my fight. But what really frustrates me is that this has been happening quite often over the last two years. Everything is perfect, 6–2, everything is going well, I’m feeling the ball—and then suddenly there’s a sharp drop in energy.

Serbian Journalist No. 3: Could you maybe tell us a bit more specifically what that was?

Novak Djokovic: I cannot. I do not want to. I do not want to. Sorry.

Serbian Journalist No. 3: OK.

Serbian Journalist No. 4: Novak, on social media someone described you using basketball terminology. They described you as an NBA player, saying that in terms of winning you are like Jordan, and in terms of longevity you are like LeBron James. They said that this is literally the only such example we have in tennis, and probably in other sports as well.

Novak Djokovic: Thank you.

[stotty]

For me, when this tournament started, I felt Novak needed three things to go his way to win the whole thing: a w/o in the latter rounds, one of either Sinner or Alcaraz to get knocked out, and play the match of his career be it Sinner or Carlos.

Well, the stars nearly aligned. It just needed Zverez to knock Carlos out to pave the way for Novak to win the final. It so nearly panned out.