Novak Djokovic at end of long season
November 24th, 2009 | 
Author: Novak Djokovic facing physical test
Novak Djokovic is just trying to hold on through this week at the end of a long and draining season which has resulted in the Serb putting pressure on his rivals in a press to move towards the world No. 2 ranking.
Djokovic stretched his current win streak to 11 straight matches with his late-night defeat of Nikolay Davydenko in nearly three hours at the ATP World Tour Finals.
But his upcoming group date with dangerous swede Robin Söderling has the winner of three titles in six weeks concerned about his durability.
“Generally I’m very exhausted because of the long season”, confessed Djokovic, whose weak point used to be that he had no stamina and was beset with breathing problems. “But when you have bad days and still manage to find a way to win, that’s something that is great to have in your game”.
Djokovic is coming on strong behind No. 2 Nadal, next man ahead of him in the ranking queue. But he can also see that the Spaniard is struggling to get through to the end of what for him as been a poor season.
The Serb is more concerned about playing Söderling, French Open finalist who became the first man to eve beat four-time winner Nadal at Roland Garros. “We’re gonna have a tough match, there are no easy ones here. I just hope physically I recover”.
Posted in 
Novak in Group B with Nadal, Davydenko and Soderling!
The best eight singles players and the best eight doubles teams of the season have qualified for the Barclays ATP World Tour Finals. The world’s biggest indoor tournament begins on Sunday, November 22, at the beautiful O2 Arena in London and will be played until November 29.
caption id=”attachment_137″ align=”alignleft” width=”525″ caption=”Novak Djokovic”
/caption
The best Serbian tennis player is the third best ranked in the ATP Race standings this year, and he’ll be no.3 seed.
The tournament will be a round robin format with eight players divided in two groups of four players. Novak is placed in Group B, with Nadal, Davydenko and Soderling. Read the rest of this entry »
Djokovic battles into semi-finals
Fourth seed Novak Djokovic survived a tough encounter with Fernando Verdasco to win 7-6 (7-2) 1-6 7-5 6-2 and reach his third straight US Open semi-final.
Djokovic saved two set points before taking the opener in a tie-break. Verdasco stormed back to level but was edged out of the third and was hampered by injury as Djokovic sealed victory. Defending champion Roger Federer or Robin Soderling, who meet under the floodlights later on Wednesday, will face Djokovic in the semi-finals.
Federer has ended Djokovic’s hopes of success at Flushing Meadows in each of the last two years, beating the 22-year-old Serb in the final in 2007 and in the last four 12 months ago. But whoever he plays next, Djokovic will know he needs to produce a more consistent performance than he did against Verdasco if he is to reach Sunday’s final.
Brilliant Novak Djokovic
Nole powers into the quarter-finals
World no.4 Novak Djokovic defeated no.15 seed Czech Radek Stepanek in straight sets 6-1, 6-3, 6-3 in 1 hour and 46 minutes to book a quarter-final spot at the US Open.
Novak broke Stepanek’s service twice in the first set, in the fourth and sixth game, and then served out to love for 6-1.
Stepanek held in the opening game of the second set, but couldn’t hold pressure from Djokovic for much longer. Nole made two breaks to go 4-1 up. The Czech got one break back and held for 4-3. Stepanek was serving to stay in the second set, but with two poor forehands he handed Novak two break/set points. No.15 seed saved the first with a great first serve but Djokovic capitalised on the second chance to grab the set 6-3. Read the rest of this entry »