Novak Djokovic defied the sands of time once again as he beat Felix Auger-Aliassime in an astonishing quarter-final that concluded after five hours and 15 minutes, but former British No 1 Greg Rusedski fears the length of that contest may have ended the Serbian\u2019s hopes of winning Wimbledon.<\/p>\n
At the age of 39, Djokovic found a way to beat 25-year-old Auger-Aliassime 7-6(10), 3-6, 6-3, 6-7(4), 7-6 (10-4), as he reached a remarkable 55th Grand Slam semi-final.<\/p>\n
The trouble for Djokovic<\/a> is he will now have to overcome world No 1 Jannik Sinner, who cruised into the last four at Wimbledon once again with a straight sets win over Germany\u2019s Jan-Lennard Struff.<\/p>\n Now Djokovic has a couple of days to recover before facing a rematch with Sinner, who he beat in the Australian Open semi-finals back in January.<\/p>\n Yet Rusedski has suggested Djokovic\u2019s hopes of beating Sinner again have taken a pounding along with his body after his draining match against Auger-Aliassime.<\/p>\n Novak Djokovic and Lionel Messi share a common trait that sets them apart<\/a><\/p>\n \u2018I am not happy\u2019 \u2013 Novak Djokovic issues furious complaint during Wimbledon quarter-final<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not on the fence on this,\u201d declared Rusedski on his podcast.<\/a> \u201cI\u2019m putting myself on the line. I called Djokovic to win a 25th Grand Slam title at Wimbledon, but he has just used up too much energy.<\/p>\n \u201cThe tank cannot recover. Yes, Djokovic historically has been able to do so, but I think that\u2019ll be the problem. Sinner will make the points long.<\/p>\n \u201cDjokovic can\u2019t go backhand to backhand as he did against Auger-Aliassime. Yes, he\u2019s going to try to break down the forehand. Sinner\u2019s going to get that work in. He\u2019s going to clean it up. He\u2019s going to be focused. He hasn\u2019t won a major this year. He hasn\u2019t been to the final of a major yet this year. And on top of that, with Novak, I just can\u2019t see it after this brutal match that happened.<\/p>\n \u201cHow can he recover? The next forty eight hours, you know, is he allowed an IV? Is he gonna take ice baths? How\u2019s he gonna get his body ready? He\u2019s definitely not hitting any tennis balls whatsoever tomorrow.<\/p>\n \u201cTomorrow\u2019s just recovery, recovery, recovery. And if he can bounce back, the tennis is there. But I\u2019ve got to give the advantage now to Jannik Sinner just because of the physical match he\u2019s played.<\/p>\n \u201cCan he bounce back at 39 years young? If he does, he\u2019s got a shot. But I don\u2019t know if the body will allow him to perform in the manner that he wants to.\u201d<\/p>\n Djokovic admitted he didn\u2019t know how his body would react after the Auger-Aliassime epic, as he suggested he was surprised that is still able to compete against players from a different generation in his 40th year.<\/p>\n \u201cAt this stage of my career, it\u2019s a surprise that I\u2019m still able to battle these young guys that have 15 years less than me, that I\u2019m able to beat them at the tightest possible scoreline,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, in a sense, it is really a nice surprise. But at the same time, I always have the highest expectations for myself. I can be very self-critical, very hard on myself. At the same time, I try to also enjoy the moments like this. I don\u2019t know what tomorrow brings.<\/p>\n \u201cTo be honest, let\u2019s see. I\u2019m still in the tournament. I still want to go at least one more step further. But this was as good as a final for me. I gave it all that I had, gave it my best.<\/p>\n \u201cI think it was really thrilling experience for us players, but also crowd present in the stadium, I\u2019m sure also a lot of people watching on TV. Glad to be part of another historic match.\u201d<\/p>\n Djokovic\u2019s comment that his win against Auger-Aliassime was \u2018as good as a a final\u2019 in his eyes will be music to Sinner\u2019s ears, as he knows he will be facing one of his biggest rivals at a moment when he is struggling to recover from one of the longest matches of his career.<\/p>\n READ NEXT: Novak Djokovic winning his 25th Grand Slam at Wimbledon \u2018makes the most sense\u2019<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n The post Novak Djokovic told his hopes of beating Jannik Sinner at Wimbledon may already be dashed<\/a> appeared first on Tennis365<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Novak Djokovic defied the sands of time once again as he beat Felix Auger-Aliassime in an astonishing quarter-final that concluded after five hours and 15 minutes, but former British No 1 Greg Rusedski fears the length of that contest may have ended the Serbian\u2019s hopes of winning Wimbledon. At the age of 39, Djokovic found […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2456","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2456","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2456"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2456\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2456"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2456"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2456"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}More Tennis News<\/h2>\n