Novak Djokovic has never been afraid of sharing his opinions, and along with his remarkable tennis talent, it has earned him legions of fans.
After all, if he sees an injustice, he will call it out, as he did around this time last year at the Cincinnati Open.
During Jack Draper’s win over Felix Auger-Aliassime, there was huge controversy on match point as the former appeared to have claimed the victory with a great get from the Canadian’s drop shot.
However, there was bemusement as Auger-Aliassime pleaded with the chair umpire to review the footage, insisting that there had been a double bounce.
Draper pleaded ignorance, and later admitted he would have conceded the point had he known for sure it was not up. In the end, the arguing ceased, and the match was decided.
It was later revealed that Auger-Aliassime was, in fact, correct.
What Novak Djokovic said about ‘ridiculous’ Cincinnati Open farce last year
Novak Djokovic was clearly enraged by this ruling and would state as much in his post-match reaction.
He wrote, in an impassioned tweet: “It’s embarrassing that we don’t have video replay of these kind of situations on the court.
“What’s even more ridiculous is that we don’t have the rule in place that would allow chair umpires to change the original call based on the video review that happens off the court!
“Everyone who watches TV sees what happened on the replay, yet the players on the court are kept in [the] ‘dark’ not knowing what’s the outcome. We have Hawk-Eye for line calls, we live in the technologically advanced 21st century! Please respective Tours, make sure this nonsense never happens again.”
Fortunately, since then, Hawkeye has been widely implemented across the tour to avoid such mistakes, with Wimbledon the latest to abolish human line judges in favour of it.
And yet, there was still great controversy as the electronic line calling failed during one Wimbledon match, drawing scrutiny.
Novak Djokovic has missed so many Cincinnati Open events recently
In the last two years, Djokovic has made a clear and concerted effort to reduce his schedule, and as such has culled many elite events from his calendar.
Frustratingly for the Cincinnati Open organisers, the tournament has now been a regular omission from the Serbian’s yearly plan.
It’s therefore almost ironic that, the two times he has played in the last six years, he has won the title both times.
The first, in 2020, saw him stroll to success, beating Jan-Lennard Struff, Roberto Bautista Agut and Milos Raonic on his way to the title.
However, his 2023 triumph was not so simple, beating Taylor Fritz and Alexander Zverev for the pleasure of reuniting with the man who had just ended his Wimbledon dominance the month earlier: Carlos Alcaraz.
Here, they played out one of the greatest best-of-three matches of all time, with Djokovic coming out on top.
He is yet to return since then, and if that is to be his final match at the Cincinnati Open, it’s certainly a fitting one.
