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They fought out another engrossing baseline exchange, only for Djokovic to initially hurt de Minaur with an extreme angle on a crosscourt forehand before blasting an inside-out forehand winner to get back on serve. It was a stampede from that moment.
Djokovic held to love to level the set, then afforded de Minaur just one point as he broke the Australian warrior again to earn the chance to serve the match out.
He did not drop another point in sealing his path to the final eight, finally putting a stop to de Minaur’s stout resistance.
Even in defeat, de Minaur was mostly magnificent.
Alex de Minaur lunges for a backhand during his four-set defeat to Novak Djokovic.Credit: Getty Images
He glued himself to the baseline and played aggressively whenever he could in the many exchanges he found himself in with Djokovic – and the longer they went, the better he was.
De Minaur won 36 of 52 points when rallies lasted nine shots or more, and many of them were absolutely spectacular, but Djokovic did his damage with first-strike tennis. Djokovic almost doubled his rival’s winning rate when points lasted four shots or fewer, and the contest trended that way late.
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De Minaur had to give up his well-earned Wimbledon quarter-final shot at Djokovic last year because of a freak hip injury he sustained on the third-last point of his fourth-round win over France’s Arthur Fils.
In between, he soared to a career-high ranking of No.6, spent months out either side of the US Open recovering from the hip setback, reached his maiden Australian Open quarter-final, then revealed after an early Roland-Garros defeat that he was battling burnout and mental fatigue.
De Minaur entered this year’s Wimbledon under the radar after losing his top-10 ranking and only grasscourt match this year.
But the world No.11 eased his way into the tournament with a friendly draw – seeing off Roberto Carballes Baena and qualifiers Arthur Cazaux and August Holmgren – and was ready for Djokovic when the opportunity arose.
Very few pundits gave de Minaur any chance of causing an upset, but all bets were off after a half an hour of madness.
Battling wind and nerves, Djokovic inexplicably double-faulted four times and committed 11 unforced errors to drop serve twice and sink into a 4-1 hole. The lunacy continued when Djokovic crashed a forehand into the net to not only concede serve for a third time, but also the opening set 6-1.
Djokovic survived de MInaur’s challenge to book an eighth straight quarter-final at Wimbledon and 16th overall.Credit: AP
For context, the super Serb’s sole break in the tournament before that came while serving for the match against his compatriot Miomir Kecmanovic in the previous round.
Carlos Alcaraz (2023 final), Federer (2019 final), Sam Querrey (2016 third round) and Rafael Nadal (2011 final and 2007 semi-finals) are the only other players to ever win a set in such dominant fashion over Djokovic at Wimbledon.
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De Minaur could not have dreamed of a better start.
He deserved at least some credit for what transpired, but the opening set was an extremely rare case of Djokovic largely beating himself. What that set did was give de Minaur a foothold in the contest – and the match truly began from that stage.
Even as Djokovic flexed his muscles to instantly break de Minaur in the second set, the Australian hit back immediately for one-all on his sixth chance after a brilliant return then pouncing to knock off a volley.
But de Minaur consistently had to work overtime on serve, particularly as he struggled to find his radar on his first ball, and Djokovic kicked away once more for 3-1.
The period that came next was arguably de Minaur’s finest of the match as he continually dug deep, absorbed pressure and found ways to hang tough with the greatest baseliner the sport has ever seen.
A dipping crosscourt forehand pass brought de Minaur back on level terms at three-all, but the Australian double-faulted to start his next service game and eventually conceded to love when Djokovic drop shot landed out of his grasp.
de Minaur was unable to reach the Wimbledon quarter-finals for the second year in a row.Credit: AP
Even then, as Djokovic served to level the match, he dumped consecutive volleys into the net to leave the door ajar. Two break points followed later, but it was the second that de Minaur will bemoan.
He produced a sensational return, only to miss his next shot as he hunted a cheap point. Two points later, Djokovic was a set-all and urging the Serbian fans to crank the volume.
Both players fended off break points to start the third set, and the standard soared as they went blow-for-blow to four-all. But a Djokovic uprising was never far away in the clutch moments. He restricted de Minaur to 15-40, then watched as another rush of blood from the Australian gifted him the break.
“Nole” chants broke out across the stadium when de Minaur dumped a forehand into the net to hand Djokovic set point, and he dinked a forehand into the opposite service box to go two-sets-to-one up.
As much as de Minaur tried, he could not quite reel that advantage in.
Marc McGowan travelled to Wimbledon with the support of Tennis Australia.
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