The Hindu : Sport / Tennis : Djokovic — a fine mix of free spirit and spirited player

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Aug 17, 2007
ePaper

Sport

Sport - Tennis

Djokovic — a fine mix of free spirit and spirited player

The young Serb spends his time either imitating top players or beating them, writes
Rohit Brijnath

— Photo: AFP

Refreshing: Novak Djokovic introduces a rare freshness in a sometimes over-wrought sports world

This extrovert with the neatly engineered game and crooked grin, his name is spelt D-j-o-k-o-v-i-c, and it’s pronounced as jo-ko-vich. It’s probably best that you know this now. Because it’s fair to say you’ll be saying his name a lot hereafter. Because since 2004, his ranking has improved each year from 187, to 83, to 3 now, and one of these years when the Fed is fed up, that number could be 1.

Yes, it’s true, Novak Djokovic may be that good. But it’s understandable if you didn’t think so. After all, who’d ever think a fellow whose game is absent of a distinctive feature, and who prances around in public in his underwear, could ever amount to anything.

Hilarious encounter

This Serb, who in turn scalped Roddick and Nadal and Federer at the recent Rogers Cup, evidently has a thing for encores. Off court as well.

In Montreal, as the players concluded their role in a fashion show, Djokovic had a hilarious encounter with James Blake which he said went like this: “How much would you offer me if I go (down the ramp) in underwear? He said, well, pretty much. So I said, okay, let me try”. So Djokovic grabbed an Italian player for company and, as the show ended, did his brief walk in briefs. “The people were confused’, Djokovic said. “Who are these guys? What are they doing? It was pretty strange.”

You have to love Djokovic because he is pretty strange, but a nice kind of strange, finding that endearing balance between free spirit and spirited player, a gifted 20-year-old trying to stay normal in an abnormal world. At Adelaide, earlier this year, during a rain break, he volunteered to amuse the bored audience.

On YouTube, you’ll find clips of him singing “I will survive”, doing kung-fu moves in the locker room and imitating the service actions of Roddick and Hewitt.

Not many players can mimic their peers, chastise them on court, and still be liked, and as Blake says, “he can keep everyone amused and laughing”

We ask too much from athletes. We want them to fight till the death yet remember it’s only a game; to bring complete devotion to their craft yet not forget that there is more to life than sport.

Single-minded

Rarely, and briefly, an athlete will manage to do all this, be all things to all people, both single-minded about his sport yet a rounded personality, driven by winning but not dependent on it yet.

Sport needs Djokovic, for he refreshes the senses like a refrigerated beer. He is earnest, and unspoiled enough, to believe that “tennis is my life, but it’s not everything”, offering the wide-eyed philosophy that “You got to do everything with a smile, otherwise you are going to freak out”. He is an engaging presence in a sometimes over-wrought sports world and we should relish him because what he is now will not last.

Innocence never lasts, it is rudely shouldered aside by expectation. Eventually Djokovic will be expected to win slams, and if he does not his jocular manner will be interpreted as absent concentration. He will change because pressure plays hell with philosophies about smiling.

Djokovic’s intriguing quality extends to his game, which is all smooth solidity yet bereft of any one facet that insists “look at me”, like Gonzales’ forehand, or Roddick’s serve, or Gasquet’s backhand. But nothing stands out is another way of saying Djokovic is learning to do all things equally well.

Exceptional

Blake sees him as “an exceptional player. He’s another one of those guys that doesn’t seem to have a weakness.” Roddick added: “He’s solid. He never plays himself out of a point. He’s able to hit four shots on the court from any position — short, deep, up the line and crosscourt.”

Men’s tennis has been distilled into a two-man affair, Federer and Nadal between them owning the last 10 Grand Slams. Now Djokovic is threatening to trespass on their turf. As he said, with a grin, when asked about the fact that the Montreal event is called the Rogers Cup: “Yeah, nothing against the sponsor, but obviously I’m going to have to arrange somebody to call Novak’s Cup for next year”.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport