Novak Djokovic registered a 7-6(6), 7-6(6), 5-7, 6-4 victory over Hubert Hurkacz in the Wimbledon 2023 on Monday; will face Andrey Rublev in the quarterfinals.
The second seed, Novak Djokovic, went to the Wimbledon 2023 quarterfinals on Monday, but he need an additional day and a lot of effort to do the task. The seven-time champion defeated Hubert Hurkacz in four sets, 7-6(6), 7-6(6), 5-7, 6-4, after winning the opening two sets on Sunday evening. The seven-time champion returned to Centre Court 16 hours later and losing the third set.
“Big credit to Hubert for playing an amazing match, tough luck for him today,” Djokovic said in his on-court interview. “But he put up a great performance. Honestly, I don't recall the last time I felt this miserable in returning games to be honest, due to his incredibly accurate and powerful serve.”
Hurkacz's serve hindered Djokovic, who is renowned as one of the greatest returners in history, during the course of two days of play. It wasn't until the fourth set, at 3-3, when the 17th seed lost service for the first time in the game or the tournament. But after three hours and six minutes, Djokovic made a breakthrough and advanced.
“He’s got one of the best serves in the world and it's so difficult to read it. Playing obviously on the quickest surface in [the] sport, grass court, it really favours big servers. So it was not really [an] enjoyable match for me, I must say,” Djokovic said. “But I guess in the important moments, yesterday last night, I was fortunate really, to win that first set. I was 3/6 down in the tie-break. This match definitely could have gone a different way. But I guess I held my nerves when it mattered and I'm happy to win.”
The 23-time major champion, who has now won 32 straight tour-level matches on grass, prevailed in four sets, but it could have been much more tense. In the first set tie-break, Djokovic fended off three set points, and in the second set tie-break, he recovered from falling behind late in the mini-break.
After the conclusion of the second set on Sunday at 10:35 p.m. local time, tournament referee Gerry Armstrong called a timeout because it seemed highly improbable that the match would be finished by the curfew of 11 p.m. Hurkacz restarted play with a calmer style of tennis, which enabled him to take the third set. His 33 aces made the Serbian nervous.
However, Djokovic prevailed and will now face Andrey Rublev, the seventh seed, who on Sunday upset Alexander Bublik in five sets. The 23-time major champion has a 3-1 advantage in their Lexus ATP Head2Head matchup after Rublev prevailed on clay in the 2017 Belgrade final.
Djokovic did not suffer a set loss of more than four games in any of their three prior encounters. These conflicts occurred during the Australian Open this year and the Nitto ATP Finals in 2021 and 2022, respectively.
