Novak: Rafa Proved Everybody Wrong

By Richard PagliaroConventional wisdom—and several Grand Slam champions—suggested cooler Roland Garros conditions in autumn could favor Novak Djokovic in his quest to dethrone king of clay Rafael Nadal.After all, chilly conditions sapped some of the spiking bounce from Nadal's topspin and the second-seeded Spaniard made no secret of his disdrain for the new Wilson ball debuting in Paris this year. Factor in the closed roof for today's final provided much calmer conditions than the wild whipping wind the world No. 1 couldn't tame in his 2019 semifinal loss to Dominic Thiem and the conditions were ripe for a Djokovic win, right?More: Nadal Dismisses Djokovic for 13th RG TitleWrong.Nadal mastered all comers and all conditions sweeping to his 13th Roland Garros championship without surrendering a set.A gracious Djokovic conceded his rival proved all skeptics wrong."Look, I was also thinking that these conditions are more favorable to me," Djokovic said. "I was feeling great throughout the tournament playing, playing great tennis, winning in Rome, being very confident about my game."But, yeah, I mean, Rafa has proven everybody wrong. That's why he's a great champion. He just played a fantastic match today. That's all."

While you can criticize Djokovic for falling in love with his vaunted drop shot—the top seed played four droppers in the opening game, which Nadal handled capably breaking to open—the 17-time Grand Slam champion said Nadal's defense was a bigger reason for his victory than Djokovic's drop-shot happy tactics."I mean, yeah, it didn't work great today, let's say. He was winning a lot of those dropshot points that were played by my side," Djokovic said. "I was probably rushing a bit much, trying to play shorter points, probably go for winners. I probably wasn't constructing the points well."That reflected on the result. But that was also caused by him, by his amazing defense. He was getting a lot of balls back. Normally all the shots that I play after two, three quick exchanges from the back of the court, forehand or backhand, when I hit it against nine out of ten guys, it's a winner, the point is done. But not against him, in these conditions especially."Ultimately, Nadal played a much cleaner match committing 38 fewer unforced errors than Djokovic, who littered 52 unforced errors in a straight-sets defeat."I mean, he was not missing a lot at all first two sets," Djokovic said. "Yeah, I kind of had to do something. Yeah, I just didn't find a solution."Photo credit: @RolandGarros