For the past five years, the coming of the ‘Next Gen’ has been one of the most hotly discussed topics in men’s tennis. When will a new star emerge to challenge the Grand Slam winning dominance of Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer?
After all, the ‘Big Three’ have shared all 12 of the past Grand Slam titles since Stan Wawrinka’s US Open 2016 victory. At the Australian Open, their dominance over the years has been particularly pronounced. Apart from Wawrinka in 2014, you have to go all the way back to Marat Safin in 2005 to find the last time one of tennis’ star trio did not prevail at Melbourne Park.
But in the opinion of Djokovic, it will not be long before a new generation of major winning champions emerge, potentially beginning this fortnight.
“They're coming closer and closer,” the defending champion said in his pre-tournament press conference on Sunday.
“(Daniil) Medvedev had a great fight with Rafa in the last Grand Slam in US Open of last season. (Stefanos) Tsitsipas played semis here last year. Dominic Thiem twice finals in French Open. They're very, very close. They're literally one set away. On a given day, in the very near future, I think that can happen. It's going to happen. It's inevitable.”
When pressed to explain why it has taken so long for another generation of Grand Slam winning stars to break through, Djokovic mused that winning a major in the current era requires a level of mental and emotional maturity that takes time to accrue.
“What they're missing?” he wondered aloud.
“I don't think they are missing too much, to be honest. They possess very powerful games that require a lot of skills, and they have those skills. But at the same time to win a slam and also to be consistently on the top level for many years, it takes a player to understand his own strengths, to kind of fight his own fears, to really be able to maintain that level for a long time. Rafa, Roger, and I, because of the past 10, 15 years, we know what we need to do mentally in this particular situation. That gives us probably a little bit of an edge.”
Over the years the Australian Open has consistently been Djokovic’s most successful Slam, a place where he has won seven of his 16 major titles. So dominant has he been at Melbourne Park over the past decade that Rod Laver Arena has become referred to as ‘his court.’
Having begun 2020 by leading Serbia to victory at the ATP Cup, demolishing his great rival Nadal in the process, it is perhaps only physical fatigue which can prevent the world No.2 adding to his title collection this fortnight.
“It was a lot of physical and emotional energy being spent in the ATP Cup, which of course was perfect for me individually, won all my matches in singles and doubles,” he said.
“We as a team won the title, which was definitely one of the highlights of my career. It was phenomenal couple of weeks and great lead-up to Australian Open. But it did take a lot out of me. I did adjust my training sessions towards that, so I had a little bit more of recuperation rather than just stepping on accelerator a little bit more.”
Still, one would not want to stand in Djokovic’s way over the next two weeks. His first round opponent Jan-Lennard Struff summarised things best when finding he had drawn the defending champion.
“God, why? Why that?” Struff said. "It's one of the draws you don't want to get first round."