Novak Djokovic is heading into yet another new season with question marks hovering over him and former Grand Slam champion Mark Woodforde believes a retirement announcement may come sooner than we think from the Serbian legend.
Djokovic is chasing a record-breaking 25th Grand Slam title, and his 11th Australian Open title in Melbourne, but the odds appear to be stacked against the 38-year-old as he aims to end a two-year dominance of Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner at the top of men’s tennis.
While Djokovic has claimed he wants to try and extend his career to play in the 2028 Olympic Games, that target seems highly ambitious for a player who has admitted his motivation is waning at the back end of his career.
Now 17-time Grand Slam-winning doubles great Woodforde has given his view on where Djokovic’s mindset may be heading into the 22nd Australian Open of his remarkable career.
“If he doesn’t, my opinion is if he doesn’t post a good result at the AO, I wouldn’t be surprised if he calls it a day,” Woodforde told Tennis365, speaking in his role as ambassador for the Bank of China Hong Kong Open. It’s just something that my opinion, my thought process.
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“Mediocrity is not something that you put into the same sentence with Novak Djokovic. I think last year, he could put that down to, you know, injuries and kind of recovering from the season before.
“I think the ageing process, unfortunately, is catching up with Novak. It accelerates as we get older. I think this is going to be really key, the Australian Open, for him and whether we’ll see the rest of Novak Djokovic in 2026.”
Former Wimbledon champion Pat Cash also spoke to Tennis365 about Djokovic’s future, as he told us he is trying to defy all logic by winning a 25th Grand Slam title against players who are from a generation behind him.
“I’m very, very interested to see how he goes,” Cash told Tennis365.
“It’s a fine balance at the end of your career to find where you are training hard enough to be fit enough to last two, even three, five set matches, but the not pushing it too far. So training hard enough to be able to last that, training too hard enough that you don’t get injured.
“You need to save enough in the tank so that you don’t get worn out and then not overtraining that you get injured before you go in there.
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“When you are younger, you can keep pushing and while you get tired, if you play a five-set match when you are younger, you know you can bounce back quickly.
“As you get later in your career, it just wanes off. I mean, that’s just the reality of it. So for Novak to still be going is absolutely phenomenal.
“He’s always coming up with solutions to problems, so it will be really interesting to see how he goes at the Australian Open.
“Has he played enough matches? Has he trained hard enough? Is he saving his body just for the matches? And if so, will that work?
“I don’t see him beating Alcaraz and Sinner in back-to-back five-set matches and that’s his problem. He can get to the semi-final again, but then he is likely to have a familiar problem.”
Pat Cash and Mark Woodforde spoke to Tennis365 at the Bank of China Hong Kong Open
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