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"He always brings out the best in these kinds of matches...with a lot of high quality tennis and intensity. You've got to match that..." Novak Djokovic gives kudos to his rival Carlos Alcaraz. Recently they met up at the semifinal of the ATP Final with the Serbian winning in straight sets 6-2, 6-3.
The pair's head-to-head was 2-all before Djokovic pushed the envelope to defeat the Spaniard. The Serbian admits how Carlos has made him a better player saying "one of the biggest rivals that I had this year...Carlos." The young Spaniard unfortunately doesn't see it exactly like that and confesses, "This match hurt me a lot...Right now I know all the things I have to improve," Alcaraz had said of the loss to Djokovic at the ATP World Finals.
Many say Carlito is being a bit hard on himself for his season was outstanding with titles and semifinal positions than outright early round losses. Six championships he's won but the losses, especially to Novak are becoming a blister in his rather clean, successful 2023 resume "I've played great matches...It's been difficult for me to realize...I feel like I am not at his level on the court.
He's very tough. He plays the same level during the whole match," Carlos frankly said about Djokovic's court performances. There was only one Championship final that the Spaniard has loss to the Serbian and that was the Cincinnati Masters.
It was his other defeats he has highlighted form Djokovic at the French Open semifinal and the present ATP one. But the Spaniard can basically only see 'the glass half empty' than 'half full' and wonders if he'll ever have success over winning in a final with the Serb.
Well, he did and that was at the most important tournament, the Wimbledon Championships the Spaniard won in a drag out 5-set drama to take the grand slam title. Alcaraz talks about his coach Juan Carlos and what they must work on.
He has said that "I had to re-watch the match, my weakness and what we have to improve for me to be a better player. I'm going to focus on this match because i felt like I had to improve a lot of things if I want to stay at his level".
Will that be possible for Alcaraz to stay at and beat Djokovic at his level? These are the pointers that the Spaniard and his team will work on. Carlos has begun to doubt his ability and comments that "I had to attack more, play more aggressively.
You have to play your 100 percent going to a line and if not...you're dead!" Alcaraz realizes the work that goes into staying on the Serbian's level and justifies why he might have loss to him saying "He has more experience than me playing in this tournament".
It was the firs time Carlito made it to the ATP World Tour Final and Djokovic's seventh. The young Spaniard has to give himself a bit of credit too for his season victories and he sums his year up saying "This match was really, really tough..but everything I did before this match I did almost perfectly so I'm really happy".