Novak Djokovic made history on Saturday, defeating Milos Raonic 1-6, 6-3, 6-4 to win the Western & Southern Open and complete his second Career Golden Masters.

Djokovic, who is a perfect 23-0 in 2020, is the only player in history to win all nine ATP Masters 1000 titles twice. Incredibly, no other player has accomplished the feat once. The 33-year-old also tied Rafael Nadal’s record for most Masters 1000 trophies with 35.

It wasn’t easy for the Serbian, though. Djokovic got off to a sluggish start in the first set less than 24 hours on from a gruelling three-hour, one-minute semi-final against Roberto Bautista Agut. The top seed had to dig deep to find his best form, clinching the title after two hours.

Novak Djokovic” />

Djokovic entered the match with a 10-0 ATP Head2Head series lead against the former World No. 3, with eight of his previous victories coming in straight sets. But the top seed struggled to work his way into rallies in the opening set.

Raonic came out firing, playing aggressively with his forehand and pressuring the top seed with his booming serve, using the body serve to elicit weak replies. Djokovic double faulted at 1-4 to give Raonic a double-break, and the Canadian closed out the set without facing a break point.

But like he did against Bautista Agut, Djokovic dug into Louis Armstrong Stadium and began to find his stride. As the favourite put more returns into play and started to neutralise the 6’5″ right-hander’s serve, Raonic began to misfire from the baseline. The forehands that beautifully opened up the court in the early going were suddenly missing their target. The Canadian was also made to run more rather than exclusively dictating.

There was a twist in the plot at the start of the decider, when Raonic broke in his first return game for a 2-0 lead. Entering the match, the Canadian had won 55 of his 57 service games (96%) for the week (96%), signaling trouble for Djokovic.

But once again, Djokovic raised his level under pressure, earning a “boomerang break” to get right back on serve. Then the Serbian tightened his grip on the momentum by breaking in his second consecutive return game. He played an incredible scoop forehand from deep in the court — a ball most players would not have retrieved — to keep a point alive, letting out a massive roar when Raonic made an error on the next shot.

The ending was not straightforward, though. Raonic crushed a backhand down the line to earn a break point as Djokovic served for the match at 5-4. The Serbian hit a 69 mph second serve, giving the former World No. 3 a chance to work his way into the point. But after a few balls back and forth in the ad court, Raonic smothered a forehand into the net. Two points later, the unseeded Canadian sailed a forehand long and Djokovic lifted his arms in celebration.

It was a difficult week for Djokovic. He needed mid-match visits from the trainer for a neck adjustment in the second round against Ricardas Berankis and the semi-finals against Bautista Agut. But nevertheless he lifted the trophy in the first tournament since the ATP Tour was suspended due to COVID-19 in March.

Did You Know?
Djokovic is the first World No. 1 to win the Western & Southern Open since Roger Federer in 2012.

When we compare first serve and second serve performance, it is fundamentally an apples to oranges comparison.

‘First serve points won’ only includes first serves that land in, while ‘second serve points won’ includes serves that land in and out. If you evaluate apples to apples by excluding double faults and only count second serves that land in the court, you gain an even greater appreciation for World No. 1 Novak Djokovic in this specific area of our sport.

An Infosys ATP Beyond The Numbers analysis of the Top 10 from the 2019 season on hard courts sees Djokovic leading the elite group of players with a lofty 66.4 per cent points won from second serves made. The other three players to all post above the 60 per cent threshold were Rafael Nadal (63.4 per cent), Roger Federer (62.7 per cent), and Daniil Medvedev (60.9 per cent).

The complete list of Top 10 players is below, including second serve performance with and without double faults.

Second Serve Performance: Top 10 On Hard Courts In 2019

When you include double faults when examining second serves, Alexander Zverev sits in 10th place in this list at 46.4 per cent. Two hundred and three double faults heavily weigh down his win percentage. But with double faults removed, Zverev’s second serve flourishes and he moves all the way up to fifth place in the grouping of Top 10 players.

This new metric provides a more focused way to evaluate second serve performance. Zverev’s second serve offers a very robust win percentage of 59.1 per cent without the double faults. It’s not universally his second serve and the shots that immediately follow that need improvement. It’s simply getting more second serves in the court.

It’s interesting to see Dominic Thiem, Gael Monfils and Stefanos Tsitsipas all grouped together so closely in the 58 percentile range in terms of second serves made win percentage. Matteo Berrettini and David Goffin are not far behind.

Second serve performance, and double faults, were an influential factor in deciding the 2019 Western & Southern Open final between Medvedev and Goffin. Medvedev won 7-6(3), 6-4, winning 63 per cent (17/27) of second serve points, while yielding just one double fault. Goffin committed seven double faults in the final, winning just 44 per cent (16/36) of second serve points.

If you subtract double faults from both players, Medvedev won 65 per cent of second serve points and Goffin won a healthy 55 per cent. By having a double fault filter on second serves, you identify that Goffin’s second serve woes didn’t occur when he hit it in. The problem was not hitting it in enough.

Novak Djokovic is one win from completing an unprecedented second Career Golden Masters. Will former World No. 3 Milos Raonic be able to stop him?

That’s the big question heading into the Western & Southern Open final, which will decide the first ATP Tour champion since play was suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Djokovic became the first player to win all nine ATP Masters 1000 titles two years ago in Cincinnati, and he will try to complete the feat for a second time on Saturday.

The Career Golden Masters is an incredible achievement, showing mastery at the highest level on both hard and clay, outdoors and indoors (Paris). Nobody else has accomplished it once, and the Serbian is on the verge of duplicating his feat. If Djokovic wins, he will also tie Rafael Nadal for the most Masters 1000 titles with 35.

Djokovic’s Masters 1000 Titles By Tournament

Most Masters 1000 Titles

The World No. 1 will take confidence knowing he leads the pair’s ATP Head2Head series 10-0. But the Serbian knows he will need to bring his best at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.

“[He has a] huge serve,” Djokovic said of Raonic, who has hit a tournament-leading 88 aces. “He’s playing well, he’s confident and let’s hope for a good final.”

Watch SF Highlights:

Djokovic needed three hours and one minute on Friday (the longest match of the tournament) against rock-solid Roberto Bautista Agut to reach the final. The Serbian will have to quickly adjust his game against Raonic, though.

The Canadian will not grind through long baseline rallies like Bautista Agut did. He will attempt to overpower the top seed with his massive serve and attack the first ball of each rally. That will make the serve and return critical. Raonic has won 55 of his 57 service games this week (96%) and he leads the tournament in first-serve points won (86%).

Most Different Masters 1000 Titles

^{*Includes ATP Masters 1000 Hamburg}
The World No. 30 will try to make history of his own, as he can become the first Canadian to win an ATP Masters 1000 title. The 29-year-old, who hasn’t tasted ATP Tour glory since 2016 Brisbane, is into his fourth championship match at this level. He will try to become the first unseeded player to lift the trophy in the Open Era (0-11).

“I’m playing well. I think I’m moving much better than I definitely have in recent years. Maybe it’s been a long time [off], and I think that’s putting me in a better position so I’m able to be more effective and more aggressive earlier [in rallies],” Raonic said. “I’m able to play more on my terms and quicker on in the points.” 

Most Masters 1000 Finals

Although Raonic didn’t say so during his post-match press conference, the better match-up for him would have been against Bautista Agut. The Canadian has won all five of his ATP Head2Head matches against the Spaniard, whereas Djokovic has clinched eight of his 10 clashes against Raonic in straight sets.

Djokovic has been suffocating on return this event, winning 41 per cent of his return games to lead all players. His quarter-final opponent, Jan-Lennard Struff, is closer to Raonic’s playing style than Bautista Agut. Djokovic broke the big-hitting German five times, neutralising all of his attacks in a 62-minute victory.

Most Masters 1000 Wins

The top seed is trying to become the first World No. 1 to win the Western & Southern Open since Roger Federer beat him in 2012. But Raonic is playing tennis reminiscent of his days inside the Top 5. Will that be enough?

Did You Know?
Djokovic is appearing in his seventh Western & Souther Open final (1-5), which is tied for the second-most in tournament history with Bill Talbert. Only Roger Federer (8) has reached more championship matches at this event.

– Statistical assistance provided by Joshua Rey

To this day, everyone in Drummondville remembers the moment they witnessed the future of Canadian tennis. In fact, there is a poster commemorating the historic encounter between Denis Shapovalov and Felix Auger-Aliassime on display at the Challenger Banque Nationale de Drummondville.

It was on 19 March 2017 that Shapovalov, 17, and Auger-Aliassime, 16, battled in front of the home fans, in what was the youngest ATP Challenger Tour semi-final in nearly 30 years. At the time, they were relatively unknown teens, ready to introduce themselves to the world.

On Saturday, two new fresh faces will assume that role on the clay of Trieste, Italy. Carlos Alcaraz and Lorenzo Musetti will duel for a spot in the championship match at the Tennis Club Triestino. It will be the youngest semi-final on the Challenger circuit since that momentous all-Canadian encounter three years ago.

Watch On Challenger TV – Not Before 11:30am CET

At the age of 17 years and three months, Alcaraz is making waves in his first full season as a professional. He enters Saturday’s semi-final after dropping just one set from qualifying. That’s five wins in seven days for the Juan Carlos Ferrero pupil. Alcaraz is already no stranger to the big moment, having triumphed in his ATP Tour debut in February in Rio de Janeiro. At 3:00am, he stunned countryman and World No. 41 Albert Ramos-Vinolas for his first Top 50 win.

Armed with a mammoth forehand that leaps off the clay and a laser backhand, Alcaraz is fast becoming one of Spain’s top #NextGenATP prospects. He will meet Musetti for the first time, in what could very well be the birth of a new raucous rivalry.

Musetti, aged 18 years and five months, is ready for a breakthrough of his own. A spot in his first Challenger championship is on the line and the Carrara native will be bolstered with the home crowd on his side.

Musetti has also not dropped a set in the main draw in Trieste, capped by a routine 67-minute win over Juan Pablo Ficovich in Friday’s quarter-finals. The Italian is already battle-tested at this level, having competed in 17 Challenger events in 2019. His lone previous semi-final came in Milan, where he fell to eventual champ Hugo Dellien.

The 2019 Australian Open boys’ champion has proven his game translates to all surfaces. The agile Musetti boasts big groundstrokes that slice through the court and impressive court awareness for a teenager.

It is sure to be a must-watch encounter on Saturday afternoon, when Alcaraz and Musetti duel at 11:30am CET in Trieste.

Perfection is no easy feat, and Novak Djokovic’s undefeated record this season was certainly put to the test late Friday afternoon.

The World No. 1 fended off apparent neck discomfort and an unrelenting opponent to beat eighth seed Roberto Bautista Agut 4-6, 6-4, 7-6(0) in three hours, one minute en route to the Western & Southern Open final. Djokovic is now 22-0 on the season.

“[It was a] very strange match, I must say. I don’t know how I won it, to be honest. He was the better player,” Djokovic said on court after his triumph. “I just didn’t feel good on the court at all, in any aspect of my game and of the body. But somehow, I managed to pull this one through.”

Djokovic only served three times in the final-set tie-break and each of them was an ace. Regardless of how solidly Bautista Agut played throughout the marathon, Djokovic went into “lockdown mode” when it mattered most to seize his victory. He has won 19 of his past 20 tie-breaks dating back to winning three of them against Roger Federer in last year’s Wimbledon final, including all 10 this season.

For a large portion of the memorable match, Bautista Agut was doing to Djokovic what the Serbian does to the rest of the ATP Tour. The Spaniard dug into baseline rallies and forced the top seed to do something special to beat him. Djokovic carved many drop shots to try to get Bautista Agut off his game, and in many instances that didn’t work. 

“It’s a balance between patience and [playing with] controlled aggession,” Djokovic said. “When you have a chance you have to go through it. You have to not only move him around left and right, but forward and backwards, mix it up with pace, spin and depth. You just have to put a lot of variation in the game. He’s a very consistent player.”

Even still, Djokovic took control and appeared on the verge of victory when leading 5-2 in the third set. But Bautista Agut never went away, rallying to serve for the match at 6-5. Djokovic did not panic, getting back on serve to force the deciding tie-break.

Djokovic snapped a three-match hard-court losing streak against the 32-year-old. Bautista Agut was trying to become one of only three players to win four consecutive hard-court matches against Djokovic, joining Andy Roddick and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga. 

“I was very close to winning. I served for the match and
I was two points away [from winning],” Bautista Agut. “[I can be disappointed or] I can take the other
way and think that I made a good comeback to the tour-level. I played really good matches this week, and I was
serving for the match against the No. 1.”

The top seed is pursuing his second Career Golden Masters. Djokovic has won all nine Masters 1000 events at least twice, with the exception of the Western & Southern Open. He is also trying to match Rafael Nadal’s record of 35 Masters 1000 trophies.

The 33-year-old will play former World No. 3 Milos Raonic in the championship match, in which the Canadian will chase his first Masters 1000 title. The World No. 1 leads the pair’s ATP Head2Head series 10-0.

“[He has a] huge serve,” Djokovic said. “He’s playing well, he’s confident and let’s hope for a good final.”

A key moment came at 1-2 in the second set, when Djokovic received a neck adjustment from an ATP physio. That seemed to give the Serbian a burst of energy. Instead of bailing out of rallies against the Spaniard, he increased his aggression and with his high level of play took the match from Bautista Agut, who was trying to reach his second Masters 1000 final.

The eighth seed was gritty, rallying from a break down in the second set to get back on serve. But at 4-5, the Louis Armstrong Stadium roof was closed, with predicted rain closing in. Djokovic broke in the next game to force the decider.