Djokovic: Some comments have bothered me, I will soon go into detail on my injury

Following his win over Stefanos Tsitsipas in the Australian Open final, Novak Djokovic spoke about people doubting his hamstring injury

Novak Djokovic, 2023 | © AI / Reuters / Panoramic

Sasa Ozmo

January 30, 2023

Novak Djokovic will reveal details about the injury that has been bothering him throughout the Australian Open.

Even though he didn’t practice in between matches, Djokovic was able to win his 10th Australian Open title on Sunday, losing only one set en route – to Enzo Couacaud in the second round.

Djokovic’s coach Goran Ivanisevic said that 97 percent of the players would have withdrawn from the tournament after seeing MRI results Djokovic saw.

“He said it exactly – 97 percent? These two weeks I was thinking whether I should publish anything about the injury, and I told myself that I will, I want to,” the Serb said after his straight sets win over Stefanos Tsitsipas. “I will go into more detail and publish some photos on social media about everything we went through. I don’t want to sound pathetic; I won the trophy. But two years ago, a similar thing happened, and people are doubting (that injury) even today, they say all kinds of things, make fun of it etc. I feel the need to show and prove certain things. Not so much for those people, but for me – some comments bother me a little. You will get to know everything in a few days time.”

It was very exhausting since the moment I came to Australia – started with injury, things with my father, a lot of things piled up – Djokovic

During the Australian Open, Djokovic said he never once practiced on his off days.

“That fact speaks for itself, it says that the injury represented something that I needed to address in a proper way, so that I could recover for my next match. If it was just a small issue, then I would practice, right? I have never experienced this situation before, to not practice on off days since the start of the tournament,” the10-time Australian Open champion said before adding, “There are certain things that I would have liked to work on in practice – at least half an hour, some patterns for my next opponent for instance. I wanted to in the last four or five days, but my team stopped me: they said ’no’ and I accepted it“.”

Serbia's Novak Djokovic receives medical attention after sustaining an injury during his third round match against Bulgaria's Grigor Dimitrov at the 2023 Australian Open — Serbia’s Novak Djokovic receives medical attention after sustaining an injury during his third round match against Bulgaria’s Grigor Dimitrov at the 2023 Australian Open Image Credit: AI/Reuters/Panoramic

The Serb went on to explain how difficult it has been to deal with everything in the past month.

“It was very exhausting since the moment I came to Australia – started with injury, things with my father, a lot of things piled up,” he said. “But I obviously needed all of that, God made my path the way it should be. I am telling you this from the bottom of my heart – I have believed in God my whole life, I believe in guardian angels and I have felt their support more than any other time, talking about what I had to deal with when it comes to my body.”

In the end, Djokovic managed to overcome those troubles to win his 22nd Grand Slam title, equaling him with Rafael Nadal.

The Serb will also become world No 1 once again on Monday, starting his 374th week at the top of the game.