He’s the only one of the Big Three to drop a set thus far, but defending champion Novak Djokovic was untouchable on Friday in the third round, mastering Yoshihito Nishioka 6-3 6-2 6-2.
The record seven-time Australian Open champion raised eyebrows momentarily on opening night, dropping a 6-2 set to Jan-Lennard Struff, misfiring three double-faults in a single game and unsuccessfully attempting a Nick-Kyrgios-like tweener passing shot.
But the Djokovic winning machinery clicked into gear in a sunny Rod Laver Arena on Friday, the sleek Serb producing an awesome serving performance. He fired 17 aces, won 93 per cent of points off his first delivery and almost half his serves went unreturned.
MORE: All the results from Day 5 in Melbourne
By the time he went two sets up, in less than an hour, Djokovic had conceded a single point on his serve. If he ever had a better serving day, the 32-year-old champion couldn’t remember it.
“Definitely one of the best serving matches I’ve had lately, inspired by coach Goran [Ivanisevic] who came today,” Djokovic said, acknowledging the 2001 Wimbledon champion and famous ace man, who joined his team in 2019.
It’s 2-0 for Djokovic versus Japan this week; wildcard Tatsuma Ito also salvaged seven games from the champion in the previous round.
The No.71-ranked Nishioka was making his debut in a Grand Slam third round, and impressed in a straight-sets upset of No.30 seed Dan Evans, who had come in with strong form from the ATP Cup. But the creative left-hander felt like a spectator for much of Friday’s match, going down an early break in each set and seeing some of his best shots returned as superhuman Djokovic gets.
The world No.2 punctured Nishioka’s serve at will, winning five of six break points, while Djokovic gave the underdog a look at just one break point, and that was in the last game.
Some slice-and-dice points kept the awed crowd mildly entertained, but Nishioka, who took three games from Djokovic at the Davis Cup in their only previous meeting, was fast running out of ideas; in the third set, he drew applause merely for getting to 30-15 on his service game, the crowd appreciating the monumental difficulty of his task.
It was over in a merciful 85 minutes, the No.71 Japanese giving Djokovic his 71st victory at Melbourne Park. Nishioka needn’t feel too bad; world No.1 Rafa Nadal managed only one more game against peak Djokovic in last year’s final.
At his happiest hunting ground, Djokovic has been relaxed enough to give expansive insights into his extracurriculars: his involvement in the film The Game Changers, about plant-based athletes (the Serb is gluten-free and pesctarian) and an off-season visit to a Green school in Bali, looking ahead to his own children’s education and as field research for the early childhood education centres that his foundation has built in Serbia, an off-court mission and passion for Djokovic and his wife Jelena.
On Friday, he recalled the thrill of hitting with Ivanisevic at Nikki Pilic’s academy in Munich as an aspiring junior. “He was definitely one of my childhood idols,” Djokovic recalled, probably never imagining he would eclipse the charismatic Croat with 16 Grand Slam titles.
Djokovic will expect a sterner test in the fourth round against another diminutive speedster, 14th seed Diego Schwartzman. It’s his 50th time in a Grand Slam fourth round.