Tennis player Novak Djokovic wins his 23rd Major at Roland Garros

Serb Novak Djokovic’s convincing victory over Norwegian Kasper Ruud ended in Paris, the French Open. Thus, Djokovic, now a three-time champion of Roland Garros, managed to win his 23rd Grand Slam title and set a historical record, which was witnessed by Kommersant correspondent Evgeny Fedyakov.

A charming 5-year-old girl in a pink sleeveless dress and her older 8-year-old brother in a red and white sports jacket sat on a table five meters from the Musketeers Cup – a trophy that was awarded to their father an hour ago as the winner of Roland Garros and listened as he tells 150 journalists about the greatest victory of his life. This is how the champion press conference of Novak Djokovic, who won his 23rd title at the Grand Slam tournaments and bypassed the now ex-record holder, Spaniard Rafael Nadal, took place.

“I prefer that others talk about it,” he answered the question about whether he should now be considered the greatest tennis player of our time. And two days before that, there was another press conference at which the Serb was asked how he feels before the decisive match of the tournament with the Norwegian Kasper Ruud. “I know these feelings. I have experienced them several times during my career. I know how to control myself, my emotions, how to approach finals in the best possible way. And that’s my advantage.” Novak Djokovic has to say these words, or those close to them in meaning, repeatedly. Over the past three years, the Serbian’s rivals in the decisive matches of the Grand Slam tournaments have been the Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas and the Russian Daniil Medvedev twice each, the Italian Matteo Berrettini, the Australian Nick Kirios and the Norwegian Kasper Ruud once each, but of these seven finals, the Serb lost only one. It was at the 2021 US Open when Djokovic succumbed to the monstrous psychological stress associated with the possibility of winning the fourth major of the season and could not cope with Medvedev, who had experienced failures in his two previous finals.

Now the situation looked similar. Djokovic was again only one step away from another outstanding achievement. As rivals, he, like two years ago in New York, again got a tennis player who was beaten twice in the big finals – Kasper Ruud, who last year at Roland Garros turned out to be insolvent against Rafael Nadal, and managed to take one set at the US Open by Carlos Alcaraz. This season, the Norwegian, to put it mildly, did not shine, but during the Roland Garros he got in great shape, busting Dane Holger Rune in the quarterfinals, who was considered almost the main contender for victory from the bottom half of the grid, and then did not leave a chance to Alexander Zverev from Germany .

Ruud is very good on clay. A reliable game on the back line, not the most outstanding, but tight serve, the ability to play near the net when the situation requires it – it would seem that everything is with him.

There is nothing ingenious about what the Norwegian does on the court. Nevertheless, it was precisely such tennis at the beginning of the meeting that brought Djokovic a lot of trouble.

Taking his pitch to zero, Ruud won the second game from the third break point. True, this happened not without the help of the Serb, who gave the Norwegian the last point with an obscure smash.

Djokovic, however, is as familiar with such unsuccessful debuts as great victories. Sometimes starting excitement affects, and often it just takes time to enter the game. In such cases, much depends on how quickly the Serb takes control of the situation and begins to improve. He was here for about half an hour. In the seventh game, Djokovic pulled out the last point in a crazy rally of 28 accurate shots, which again ended in a failed smash, only this time it was Ruuda. In the eighth, he won back the last break point of the Norwegian in this match by going to the net. In the tenth, he confidently eliminated the threat, having 0:30, although the Norwegian had previously torn off an ovation by winning a point with the help of an elegant twinner – a blow in which the tennis player is with his back to the net and sends the ball between his legs.

And then there was a tie-break, brilliant for Djokovic, who tore apart the defense of others with great right hands, and terrible for Ruud, who gave points in every possible way.

And 1 hour 24 minutes after the start of the match, the Serb took the lead in sets.

Before the start of the second game, the opponents left the court for almost seven minutes. And then the intrigue began to evaporate as steadily as the threat of the only rain in the entire tournament, which, contrary to forecasts, it never came to. Djokovic began an exemplary demonstration of his championship greatness. In the second game, he lost five points on his serve, in the third – only four. Ruud did not help either the wave of spectators launched before the seventh game of the third installment in the 15,000-strong stands of the court of Philippe Chatrier, or the realization that, in fact, he had nothing to lose for a long time. Leading 5:4, he first lost Djokovic’s serve to zero, then his own, and in the 12th game, with the help of someone else’s mistake, he managed to catch only one point on the first match point. As a result – 7:6 (7:1), 6:3, 7:5 in 3 hours and 13 minutes. Having the highest first serve hit rate (73%) and points won on it (80%), Djokovic also made 52 shots through with 32 unforced errors, and he went to the net more successfully.

Now Djokovic is next in line for Wimbledon, which he has won seven times. And this means that his current record can be improved in a month and a half.