As Novak Djokovic sat down to dissect his startling third-round defeat at the US Open in the early hours of Saturday morning he no longer had the patience to mince his words. He had played so terribly throughout his time in New York, he noted, that reaching the third round had actually been a success. Most of all, he felt drained after a long, intense summer.
“Obviously it had an effect,” said Djokovic. “I spent a lot of energy winning the gold, and I did arrive to New York just not feeling fresh mentally and physically. But because it’s the US Open, gave it a shot and I tried my best. I didn’t have any physical issues. I just felt out of gas.”
Across successive unforgettable nights at the US Open, as the Arthur Ashe Stadium crowd was reduced to a stunned silence at the sight of Carlos Alcaraz, the third seed, and then the second seed Djokovic being hustled out of the tournament in the early rounds by Botic van de Zandschulp and Alexei Popyrin respectively, tiredness was the common theme: “I probably came here with not as much energy as I thought that I was going to,” said Alcaraz.
Throughout this year, players have warned this season would be difficult with four significant tournaments – the French Open, Wimbledon, the Olympics and the US Open – taking place between May and September.
Olympic summers have always been difficult but the surface changes, switching from clay to grass to clay to hard courts in such a short period, have made it even more challenging. While the individual results were surprising, it is not shocking that the summer finally caught up with both of the Wimbledon and Olympic finalists.
Their departures leave the tournament in a fascinating position. Two top three men’s seeds have not been defeated so early at the US Open since 2000 and the men’s draw is as open as it has been in years, alongside the bizarre 2020 edition at the height of Covid restrictions. Jannik Sinner and Daniil Medvedev are the only grand slam champions left in the draw while Medvedev is the only former US Open champion.
It is probably not the last time a men’s draw will open up in this way. This year is the first season since 2002 that none of Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal or Roger Federer have won a slam title in a calendar year. That 2002 season produced four different champions, including two players, Thomas Johansson and Albert Costa, who each failed to reach another major final.
The big three are massive anomalies in the history of tennis, all of them winning at a historic rate and performing with a level of consistency across all four surfaces that has never been seen before. In the process, they have shut out generations of talented players from winning grand slams. Their era has come to an end, with Djokovic now almost single-handedly attempting to keep the new generation at bay.
At 21, Alcaraz is still learning the ropes of being a top player. He will almost certainly build an all-time great career and others, like Sinner, will be worthy champions. Still, upsets are a normal feature of professional tennis and in the coming years there will be so many more opportunities for a larger pool of players to contend for major titles.
For Djokovic, this summer has only further shown that he has arrived at an inflection point in his own career. After producing one of the best years at 36 years old last season, winning the Australian, French and US Open titles while coming within a set of a Wimbledon title, this has been a curious summer.
At the Olympics, Djokovic was able to produce one of his greatest performances in his sheer desperation to win the gold medal, a remarkable showing and a reminder he is still capable of performing at an incredibly high level, but it remains an anomalous result in his season. He has otherwise seemed to lack motivation, he has struggled with injuries and now tiredness. The benefit of an unusually short stay in New York is that he will have time to pause, reflect on his mixed fortunes, recalibrate his goals and figure out exactly what comes next.
