Taylor Fritz, the lone American fighter at this year’s Australian Open, has had an amazing tournament. Unfortunately, he just ran into the all-time great tennis star Novak Djokovic in the quarter-final. The two have played each other so many times, eight to be precise, that they must know each other’s game in detail by now. Yet, the 24-time Grand Slam winner has always won every single encounter between them. Fritz has a reason for it.
As the quarter-final match between the two started, Fritz didn’t show any sign of weakness. He tied the first set 7-6, before losing it by 7-3 in a tie-breaker. Fritz won the next set 6-4 and it looked like he was just getting his rhythm back. Just when it looked like he might create history, the Serbian roared back into the game as he so often does. Djokovic won the next two sets 6-2, 6-3 and booked his place in the semi-finals. Currently ranked 12, Fritz might slip back in the rankings instead of climbing up now.
After the match, when Fritz was asked in the press conference as to why he lost to Djokovic, his response, in a gist, was that Djokovic was just too good. Fritz touched upon how it is extremely difficult to steal a single point from the Serb, let alone an entire set.
To win the match is a monumental task. He also explained that the first two sets, which lasted for nearly 150 minutes, exhausted him to the core. Djokovic, on the other hand, at 36 years of age, plays in a God-like mode to never get tired yet tire out his opponents.
“I think one of the biggest things is, like, just the fact that — well, I mean, he’s so fast he doesn’t really miss a lot of balls. He definitely makes you really work and, like, hit quality shots to win points. It’s also just like the lack of free points he gives you,” said Fritz.
Djokovic’s error rate is near-negligible, which doesn’t allow much room for his opponent to take the upper hand in a game against him. His speed, agility, and stamina are something everyone is well aware of.
“That’s also why we’re playing so, like, you know, the first two sets are so long, as well. It’s, like, I never just hit a second serve and he just misses it. That just doesn’t happen. Even when I’m going after my second serve, like hitting second serves that are consistently like 100, 105 miles per hour, like jamming him, he still just puts it on the baseline. It’s definitely tough when you don’t get those free points and you have to work for every single point,” continued Fritz to explain his opponent’s dominance.
Fritz’s words echoed his haplessness against the modern-day GOAT of tennis. It’s almost as if Fritz was a different player in the first two sets against Djokovic and a completely different one in the next two sets.
Taylor Fritz touches upon his head-to-head record against Novak Djokovic
Fritz’s losing record against Djokovic started with the 2019 ATP Masters Monte-Carlo Round of 16 match. Djokovic won 6-3, 6-0 against the then 22-year-old American rising tennis player. This is exactly what Fritz explained when asked about his head-to-head record against the World No. 1, which now stands 0-9. Fritz mentions that five out of those nine games were when he was very young.
Preview: Novak Djokovic vs. Taylor Fritz – prediction, head-to-head, tournament so far – Sports Mole
Fritz’s thunderous backhand should give the American a fighting chance of avoiding yet another straight-sets losshttps://t.co/gdmnIuKKEX
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He is a very different player now and has challenged Djokovic from their sixth encounter onwards. This was at the 2022 Nitto ATP Finals, where Fritz lost 7-6 (7-5), 7-6 (8-6) in the semi-finals. He managed to tie both sets against a peak Djokovic and even came close to defeating him during the game. Unfortunately, Taylor Fritz couldn’t repeat this feat the next two times they met after that, excluding this AO quarter-final.
He is aware that out of those eight games, now nine, he only came close once to beating Djokovic. That doesn’t reflect very well on him. However, Fritz believes he is still young and has a lot of time to improve his record. At 26 years of age, Fritz reached his third quarter-final in three years. It can only be uphill for the young American from here onwards.
