When Novak Djokovic won his second French Open and 19th Grand Slam on Sunday, it was a lot more than an elusive trophy or a new record. It was a definitive, undeniable, phenomenal mark of greatness that put him above everyone else in modern men’s tennis.
The 34-year-old became the first man in the Open Era to win each of the four Majors twice. Only Roy Emerson and Rod Laver have done it before. Neither Pete Sampras, Roger Federer nor Rafael Nadal could do it (five women have achieved it as well).
It also brought his tally to 19, just one behind the all-time record shared by Federer and Nadal. A record he seems well set to break very soon.
Does it make French Open 2021 his best Grand Slam triumph? Can just one title stand out when he has won so many in such different circumstances for the last decade?
The world No 1 won the last Wimbledon title after saving two championship points. He won his first French Open title after losing in the semis or final for three straight years. He saved two match points in the semi-final en route his first US Open title. He has won the Australian Open in three different decades. He already is the first man to win all nine ATP Masters title and he has done that twice.
But what makes this Roland Garros victory special is not just the many, many records he broke but the manner in which he did it. The Serb had to overcome obstacles like never before to reach his 19th Major. Barriers that have never been previously broken, barriers both external and the ones in his own mind, all in the space of one tournament.
To recap
- He was two sets down to teenage debutant Lorenzo Musetti in the fourth round.
- He was placed in the same half as Nadal and had to battle the 13-time champion in an epic, energy-sapping semi-final, handing him just his third loss (to 105 wins)
- He was two sets down to 22-year-old Stefanos Tsitsipas in the final, and fought back to win his first Major final after dropping the first two sets.
To understand just what he has achieved, even without the context of his title race with Federer and Nadal, one has to look at just how hard it has been for him to reach both his titles in Paris.
The 34-year-old has been playing the French Open since 2005 and has failed to reach the quarter-finals just twice in 17 appearances. Roland Garros is where he made his first Major quarter-final and semi-final appearance, yet his first final came only in 2012. After his breakthrough 2011, this was the only Major missing in his Calendar Slam but he lost three finals in the next four years. He handed Nadal just his second loss there in 2015 but fell to Stan Wawrinka in a stunning upset in the final.
The talk then was focussed on how Djokovic was struggling to get there because of how desperately he wanted the Career Slam. Even with his loaded resume, the questions over his greatness candidacy lingered. He completed that particular quest in 2016, but just when it looked like a second Roland Garros would be easier, he suffered from another strange fallow period despite his terrific record on clay.
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