Novak Djokovic has taken a surprisingly salty swipe at Alex de Minaur after crushing the Australian of their fourth-round showdown on Monday evening.
Djokovic made a press release that he’s a pressure to be reckoned with at Melbourne Park, blowing de Minaur away 6-2, 6-1, 6-2 in two hours and 6 minutes.
Djokovic demolished the No. 22 seed for the lack of simply 5 video games to brush into the final eight and step up his bid for a tenth Melbourne crown, and record-tying twenty second main title in all.
He will meet fifth seed Andrey Rublev for a semi-final berth after the Russian toppled Danish teenager Holger Rune in an exhilarating five-set conflict.
Djokovic despatched de Minaur a brutal message in his on-court interview after the match — and was much more bitter when chatting with journalists in his post-match press convention.
His remark got here after he was baited by a journalist with a query round feedback de Minaur made throughout the Serbian’s deportation scandal forward of the 2022 Open.
“I don’t have any relationship with him,” Djokovic mentioned.
“I respect him as a rival, a colleague, as I respect everyone. I have no problem contacting him, congratulating him, etc. But I don’t have any other relationship. I don’t have any communication with him. He showed in 2022 what he thinks about me.”
De Minaur mentioned 12 months in the past he was uninterested in the Djokovic circus overshadowing the occasion.
While praising Djokovic as “an incredible athlete”, De Minaur mentioned Djokovic had “taken a lot of spotlight away from us competitors”.
“Look, Australians have gone through a lot. There’s no secret about that. They’ve had it very tough. They’ve done a lot of work to protect themselves and their borders,” he mentioned.
“When you’re coming in, as well as every other tennis player, if you wanted to come to the country, you had to be double vaccinated. It was up to him, his choices, his judgment. Here we are.”
The storm inside a tea cup partly explains Djokovic’s brutality on and off the courtroom.
De Minaur additionally confirmed a touch of frustration in the direction of his opponent when requested about Djokovic’s much-debated hamstring harm on Monday evening.
Djokovic has prior to now been accused of exaggerating accidents and hypothesis surrounding his left hamstring harm has swirled round Melbourne Park.
“I think everyone’s kind of seeing what’s been happening over the couple of weeks,” de Minaur mentioned.
“It’s the only thing everyone’s been talking about. Either I’m not a good enough tennis player to expose that, or it looked good to me.”
The Serbian famous person was merely ruthless after the match.
Jim Courier requested him together with his opening query: “I’m not going to ask you how you beat him so convincingly. I’ll ask you why you beat him so convincingly.”
A chilly-blooded Djokovic responded: “Because I wanted to.”
After being requested how his harm was and the way it had plagued him all through the competition, he mentioned the issues weren’t with him on Monday evening.
“Tonight it wasn’t obvious I was dealing with an injury. I mean …I didn’t feel anything today,” he mentioned.
“Today was great. I thank my medical team, my physio. Thank God anybody that really helped me.”
American star Taylor Fritz, who was knocked out by Alexei Popyrin within the second spherical, additionally commented on Djokovic’s harm hypothesis on Twitter, with an eyebrow-raising suggestion.
“My opinion that probably nobody cares about…. 80% of players are always dealing w something (severity levels differ) but everyone is honesty always a little banged up… the media is only ever focusing on the top guys so there issues get more attention,” he wrote on Twitter whereas stressing he was not speaking about any participant particularly.
“Also some players are more vocal talking about injuries then others. I don’t think people fake injuries, I do think sometimes players stretch the severity of the injury because it depressurizes them and helps them play better (which honestly is fine, do whatever works)
“I don’t think it’s done in a bad sportsmanship kind of way, and before people get defensive, I’m not talking about anyone in particular this is just what I see as a player, sometimes there r serious injuries, sometimes there over exaggerated ones from people 1-500.
“I’m not taking shots at any players so please don’t get defensive.”
