Novak Djokovic of Serbia acknowledges the crowd as he walks off the court after losing to Carlos Alcaraz of Spain on September 5, 2025. Clive Brunskill/Getty Images/AFP
New York: The odd thing about Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz’s semifinal meeting at Arthur Ashe Stadium wasn’t the level of tennis - or the score, though that does warrant a pause.
Alcaraz flaunted his virtuoso game and won, 6-4, 7-6 (7-4), 6-2, to pass another career checkpoint - it was his first time beating Djokovic on a hard court.
Yet those in the riveted crowd that piled into Arthur Ashe Stadium were pulling not for Alcaraz, the most fawned-over 22-year-old in the game, but for Djokovic. Finally, they cheered for Djokovic.
The twilight of the 38-year-old Serb’s career seems to be increasingly defined by conundrums, and this run in New York has been one of them. Djokovic has spent the bulk of his early tennis career craving the same global adoration lavished on his two greatest rivals, Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal, while he more often played the role of the villain, - or at least the uber-entertaining heel. At Grand Slams, he often oscillated between provoking the crowd and humbling himself enough to admit that he just wanted to hear them cheer his name. He famously developed a mental trick, transforming in his own mind any opponent’s name he heard during matches - "Ro-ger! Ra-fa!” - into his nickname. "No-le! No-le!” He convinced himself the crowd was chanting for him.
He didn’t have to do any mental gymnastics Friday. The crowd in New York applauded for flashy points no matter which player prevailed, making it clear they wanted to see a show. But they yelled only one name throughout the first two sets. Only crucial service holds from Djokovic - not, say, stunning winners from Alcaraz - made the crowd explode into song (The White Stripes’ "Seven Nation Army” - what else?).
One man sitting courtside kept yelling: "This is your point! This is your point!” to the Serb. The crowd was so raucously behind Djokovic that tennis’s joyous golden boy, Alcaraz, was left to play things uncharacteristically straight, as if he knew he wouldn’t be rewarded for any shows of emotion.
As a fearsome, exacting world beater, Djokovic was fun to root against. But the gap between Djokovic and what has become a Big Two of Alcaraz and Sinner has only widened: Friday was the third consecutive Grand Slam semifinal he lost to either Sinner or Alcaraz after he fell to Alexander Zverev in the semifinals of the Australian Open.
Now Djokovic has become an underdog. And he has never been more lovable.
Is that enough to keep going at 38? Maybe.
"Very thankful for that,” Djokovic said of Friday’s lovefest. "I thoroughly enjoyed myself. That’s one of the biggest reasons I keep on going. The love that I’ve been getting around the world has been amazing the last couple of years.”
The other quandary of Djokovic’s twilight is that he is still good enough to beat just about everyone else on tour except Sinner and Alcaraz. He blasted the fourth-ranked player in the world, Taylor Fritz, right off court in the U.S. Open quarterfinals Tuesday with marvelous serving and an airtight strategy that - by the way - he hadn’t altered much from the previous 10 times he beat the American. Djokovic won the Olympic singles tournament . He is not shuffling off quietly into the night.
The Grand Slams, in which the men play a draining best-of-five set format, are his problem.
"I had enough energy to battle him and to keep up with his rhythm for two sets. After that, I was gassed out, and he kept going,” Djokovic said. "That’s kind of what I felt this year also with Jannik. Best-of-five makes it very, very difficult for me to play them. Particularly if it’s like the end stages of the Grand Slam.”
The final weekend of a major tournament is the trickiest because of the cumulative effect of long matches on the body. But at this stage of Djokovic’s career, those events also matter most. He has 24 Grand Slam titles and needs one more to break his tie with Margaret Court and set a modern record.
If there’s one thing Djokovic has on his side, it’s a history of breaking the stranglehold of two players at the top of the game.
He was a much younger man when he turned Federer and Nadal’s duopoly into the "Big Three” era, and he has made a career in finding a way. As the crowd in New York showed Friday, things can still change. When asked his plans between now and the Australian Open in January, Djokovic sighed and said, "Australia’s far.”
The Grand Slams have become a tricky task for the player who has won more than any man in history. But he isn’t giving up yet.
