Serbian tennis player Novak Djokovic qualified for his 11th Australian Open final this Friday (30), by defeating Italian Jannik Sinner in a long battle with 3-6, 6-3, 4-6, 6-4 and 6-4.
‘Djoko’, looking for his 25th Grand Slam title, will face world number 1, Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz, in Sunday’s big decision.
Earlier, Alcaraz had beaten German Alexander Zverev (3rd) in an epic five-set match, 6-4, 7-6 (7/5), 6-7 (3/7), 6-7 (4/7) and 7-5.
At 38 years and 255 days old on Sunday, he will be the oldest player to reach the final in Melbourne.
This Friday, he won his 103rd match at the Australian Open and extended his record for most games won in Grand Slam tournaments to 402.
“It’s unbelievable,” Djokovic commented to the applauding audience. “We played for more than four hours [4 horas e 9 minutos]it’s almost two in the morning… This reminds me of the 2012 final against Rafa [Nadal]”, which he won in five sets and which remains the longest match in the tournament’s history (5 hours and 53 minutes).
“The intensity was very high, but I knew this was the only way to win. He pushed me to my limit,” added the Serb.
Djokovic now has a date with history: he is the man with the most Grand Slam titles in his career (24), the same number achieved by Australian Margaret Court during her career in tennis.
Court herself, now 83 years old, was present at Rod Laver Arena this Friday to watch this exciting semi-final.
If he wins the trophy on Sunday, Djokovic would achieve his much-desired 25th Grand Slam, a goal he has pursued since winning the 2023 US Open.
Since then, he had only reached the Wimbledon final in 2024, losing the decision to Alcaraz. By the 2025 season, he had reached the semi-finals of all four Grand Slams, but failed to reach the decider.
At the 2026 Australian Open, ‘Djoko’ suffered a huge scare in the quarter-finals, when he found himself losing two sets to zero to Lorenzo Musetti, who ended up withdrawing due to injury when the score was 6-4, 6-3, 1-3 in favor of the Italian.
With this Friday’s defeat, Sinner, 24, will not have the chance of a new rematch against Alcaraz, 22, in a final.
Both have appeared in three previous Grand Slam finals, with the Spaniard winning at the last Roland Garros and the US Open, and the Italian winning at Wimbledon last July.
