In a stunning development at the Australian Open, an injured Novak Djokovic withdrew after losing the first set of his semifinal match versus Alexander Zverev.
Zverev won a grueling first set in a 7–6 tiebreaker that lasted one hour and 20 minutes. Djokovic decided he couldn’t continue with a left leg injury that was hindering him throughout the match. The 10-time Australian Open champion revealed afterward that the injury was a muscle tear.
As soon as the set ended, Djokovic put his thumb up and conceded the match. Zverev and the crowd at Rod Laver Arena was hushed in disbelief.
“Please, guys — don’t boo a player when he goes out with injury,” Zverev said on-court in his post-match interview.
“I know everyone paid for tickets and everybody wants to see a great five set match. But you have to understand for the past 20 years, Novak Djokovic has given tennis absolutely everything,” he added. “He has won this tournament with an abdominal tear, a hamstring tear. If he cannot continue with this match, it means he really can’t continue.”
Djokovic set the pace early in the match and appeared to be controlling play, to Zverev’s frustration. Though the injury bothered him during his quarterfinal victory over Carlos Alcaraz and he wasn’t able to practice on Wednesday or Thursday before the match with Zverev, it didn’t appear to be an issue. That obviously changed as the first set progressed.
“Until an hour before today’s match, I did everything I possibly could to manage the muscle tear that I had,” Djokovic told reporters afterward.
“Medications and the strap and the physio work helped to some extent today,” he continued. “But towards the end of that first set, I just started feeling more and more pain, and it was too much for me to handle for me at the moment. So, unfortunate ending, but I tried.”
For Djokovic, the withdrawal means that he won’t win his record 25th major title. Injuries have prevented him from finishing two of his past four Grand Slam tournaments.
Zverev will face the winner of the other men’s semifinal between defending tournament champion and No. 1 seed Jannik Sinner and No. 21 Ben Shelton.
