On Sunday, Serbian player Novak Djokovic dominated his 20th-seeded French opponent Adrian Mannarino 6-0, 6-0, 6-3 at Rod Laver Arena. He made a rare daytime appearance at the Melbourne Park Australian Open to march towards his 11th title.
When asked about his possibility of winning without losing, he joked, “I really wanted to lose that game in the third set because the tension was building up so much in the stadium.” He added that he just needed to get that out of the way and refocus on the game.
He is now among the final eight of the Grand Slam for the 58th time. As he picked pace to record his 25th Grand Slam title, his record of being in the quarterfinals is now on par with that of Roger Federer.
Djokovic has now won 32 games in a row without suffering a setback. The last time he lost was in 2018 to Chung Hyeon of South Korea. He will now be facing seventh seed Stefanos Tsitsipas or 12th seed Taylor Fritz in the semi-finals.
He struggled with sickness and lost sets in his opening two matches at the 2024 Australian Open, but he has since improved greatly.
