Count on Novak Djokovic to seek out the injustice in a straight-sets win.
Djokovic was in the midst of a tense moment Tuesday on the Italian Open, glaring at Cameron Norrie when Norrie hit him within the left leg with an overhead — after Djokovic had given up on the purpose and turned his back to the online.
Djokovic, still the perfect and No. 1 ranked player on the earth on the age of 35, went on to a straightforward 6-3, 6-4 victory, reaching the quarterfinals of the clay-court tournament for the whopping seventeenth straight 12 months.
“I did watch the replay when he hit me. Perhaps you possibly can say he didn’t hit me deliberately. I don’t know if he saw me,” Djokovic said when asked about his stare back at Norrie, via The Guardian.
“I mean, [peripherally] you’ll be able to at all times see where the player is positioned on the court. The ball was super-slow and super-close to the online. I just turned around since the point was over for me.”
But because it seems, that was just the beginning of the complaints from Djokovic, who took issue with Norrie’s mid-match medical timeout and escalated his issues with the world No. 13 from Great Britain to an issue of “fair play.”
“It was not a lot possibly about [the overhead], however it was possibly a mixture of things,” Djokovic went on. “From the very starting, he was doing all of the things that were allowed. He’s allowed to take a medical timeout. He’s allowed to hit a player. He’s allowed to say ‘Come on’ within the face kind of each point from principally first game.
“Those are the things that we players know within the locker room it’s not fair play, it’s not how we treat one another. But again, it’s allowed, so…
“I got together with Cameron rather well all these years that he’s been on the tour. Practiced with one another. He’s very nice guy off the court, so I don’t understand this type of attitude on the court, to be honest.
“However it is what it’s. He brought the hearth, and I responded to that. I’m not going to permit someone behaving like this just bending my head. I’m going to reply to that.”
Djokovic, who has won five of the past seven majors by which he has competed while staunchly remaining unvaccinated, might be the favourite when the French Open begins Monday.
With a twenty third profession grand slam title, he would break a tie with Rafael Nadal for probably the most of all time.
Djokovic also might be eligible for this 12 months’s US Open after the federal government’s vaccination mandate for foreign air travelers ended earlier this month.
Djokovic has not won the US Open since 2018: In 2019, he retired on account of injury while two sets down within the fourth round; in 2020, he was disqualified during a fourth-round match for striking a linesperson with a ball; in 2021, he faltered one win shy of a calendar-year Grand Slam in the ultimate against Daniil Medvedev.
