“You never like losing at home that’s for sure. It’s painful it’s disappointing.”@DjokerNole speaks on his semifinal loss against Karatsev.#SerbiaOpen2021 pic.twitter.com/aAFSruRA9j

— TENNIS (@Tennis) April 24, 2021

By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Saturday April 24, 2021

After a difficult loss in Belgrade to Aslan Karatsev, which was just Novak Djokovic’s second loss of 2021, the Serb gave full props to his opponent and called him brave.

"You never like losing at home," Djokovic told reporters. "That's for sure. It's painful, it's disappointing, I don't feel so great now, but at the same time I have to congratulate Karatsev, who played very bravely, whenever he needed to come up with his best shots, he did. Congrats to him - awesome performance from his side."




Djokovic, who drops to 2-2 on clay in 2021, said that he was disappointed with his form over the course of the three-set loss, and added that he needs to improve his game significantly by the end of May, when Roland-Garros begins.

“From my side I played, again, on a quite low level in my opinion,” Djokovic said. "Some flashes of good quality tennis, I was fighting," Djokovic said "That's a positive. I was fighting all the way."

He added: "As I said it's disappointing finishing the week like this at home," Djokovoic said. "I'll say it again I lost to a better player who was just more courageous, I think he went for his shots at the right time and it worked for him."

The Serb says he isn’t quite sure about when he will play next.

“Roland-Garros still stays the main focus for me,” he said. “I need to improve. I need to play better in order to have a chance for the Roland-Garros trophy I need to play much better than I did today, or in Monte-Carlo, so, yes, there is much work ahead of me, and hopefully it can be beneficial when it matters most in Paris.”

The World No.1 hinted that he might not be back on the court for some time, though he didn’t say anything concrete about his upcoming schedule.

“I will hopefully play in four or five weeks again,” he said. “That’s the plan, so let’s see if that’s going to happen, but Roland-Garros is the goal, obviously that’s where I want to play my best.”

Speaking in Serbian, he reportedly didn’t give any clarity on his schedule:

I asked Novak whether he might play Madrid. “I don’t know, I am sick of making plans, to be honest. Grand Slams remain the main focus”.

— Saša Ozmo (@ozmo_sasa) April 24, 2021