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    The One-Handed Backhand Is on the Way to Extinction

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    How can something so beautiful to watch, a stroke so etched into tennis history, be so exploitable — and why have a dwindling handful of players remained loyal to it?Behold the beautiful and beloved one-handed backhand, but do it quickly, because time is running short for tennis’s lustiest shot.Yes, the shot that made Roger Federer famous, the signature stroke of Rod Laver, a favorite of John McEnroe, and Pete Sampras and Martina Navratilova is fast going the way of the wooden rackets of the early 1980s, a relic that generates joy and nostalgia when a tennis aesthete lays eyes upon it, but one whose days may be numbered.Even those who play with a one-hander have their regrets. Just ask Chris Eubanks, the late-blooming breakout star of American tennis this year, whose one-handed backhand is as smooth as they come. Eubanks said he was about 13 years old when he fell hard for the Federer backhand and decided to switch from the two-hander he had played with since he first picked up a tennis racket.“If I knew what I know now, I probably wouldn’t have,” Eubanks said as he sat in the lounge of his Midtown Manhattan hotel in the days leading up to the U.S. Open.Stefanos Tsitsipas is the lone man ranked in the top 10 using a one-handed backhand. He lost in the second round to Dominic Stricker, a Swiss qualifier.Earl Wilson/The New York TimesNot so long ago, the top ranks of the sport, especially the men’s game, had no shortage of one-handed backhands. In addition to Federer, Stan Wawrinka and Dominic Thiem won Grand Slam titles with the shot. Among the top 10 men now, only Stefanos Tsitsipas plays with a one-handed backhand. Tatiana Maria, No. 47 in the world, is the highest-ranked woman to rely mostly on her one-hander.In more immediate terms, it has been a mostly terrible first week for one-handed backhands in the singles competitions at the U.S. Open. As the second round wound down on Thursday afternoon, Wawrinka, who at 38 years old still rips his one-hander as hard and as clean as anyone ever has, Grigor Dimitrov and Daniel Evans were the top one-handed backhand standard-bearers remaining.“I’m not hitting as well as when I was winning Grand Slams, that’s for sure,” Wawrinka said after beating Tomas Etcheverry of Argentina on Thursday in four sets despite uncharacteristically hitting a handful of wayward backhands. But Tsitsipas, Thiem, Eubanks and Maria all lost in the first days of the tournament.So did Lorenzo Musetti, the rising Italian whose silky one-handed backhand can make tennis cognoscenti drool. His stroke starts low, sweeps up and forward practically from knee level, then flies up with a high-stretching finish. Somewhere along the way, it makes easy, pure contact, and that fuzzy yellow ball flies off his racket. Musetti, 21, is supposed to be a rival for Carlos Alcaraz, the 20-year-old world No. 1, during the next decade. Musetti is ranked 18th, but he has yet to make a Grand Slam quarterfinal.In January, Tsitsipas faced Novak Djokovic in the Australian Open final. Tsitsipas’s backhand is another of the prettiest, smoothest strokes in the sport.“My signature shot,” Tsitsipas said earlier this week. “It kind of defines me.”Yet it took about three games to figure out Djokovic’s strategy that evening — pound ball after ball deep onto the Tsitsipas backhand. Djokovic won in straight sets.And therein lies the great contradiction of the one-handed backhand. How can something so beautiful to watch, a stroke that is so etched into tennis history, be so exploitable, and why have a dwindling handful of players remained so loyal to it?The answer to the first question, experts say, is mostly a function of the increasing role of power and velocity in the sport. Even clay courts, historically the slowest surface, play hard and fast these days. Players, who spend more and more time in the gym, keep getting bigger and stronger, and now hit forehands at more than 100 miles per hour. Rackets and strings allow for so much topspin that rally balls from even average players are bouncing up to eye level, making it hard for even the 6-foot-7 Eubanks to get on top of the ball on some backhands.David Nainkin, who leads player development for men for the United States Tennis Association, has advice for any young talent he sees wielding a one-handed backhand — get rid of it. The two-handed backhand is far more stable, he said, and the motion is shorter and simpler.“It’s almost impossible to make it with a one-handed backhand now,” he said. “I think you’ll see less of it maybe in the next 10 years.”Martina Navratilova during the 1986 French Open final. She credited her mastery of the one-handed topspin backhand for her rise.Trevor Jones/Allsport, via Getty ImagesNavratilova, who credits her mastery of a one-handed topspin backhand for her rise to near invincibility in the early 1980s (thank you, Renee Richards, her coach at the time) is a little less draconian, but not that much. Navratilova said she would encourage young players to keep two hands on the racket — most of the time.“Work on the one-handed slice and volley,” she said, though she added that trying to use it to keep up with modern pace and spin likely wouldn’t work.Given all that, how to explain the ongoing devotion to the one-hander among a dwindling few?In a word, Federer.As much as the Swiss master has done for the sport, he may be more responsible for the current generation of one-handed backhand devotees — and their shortcomings — than anyone.Why does Denis Shapovalov, the talented 24-year-old Canadian who missed the U.S. Open with a knee injury, love to hit the one-hander with both feet off the ground?Federer.Eubanks?Federer.Tsitsipas?Federer. And Sampras.Watching Roger Federer inspired many of the current generation of one-handed backhand users.Mike Hewitt/Getty ImagesTsitsipas said he remembers the day when he made the commitment to the one-handed backhand. He was 8 years old. The previous day, he had played a two-hander, and his coach had made fun of him for going back and forth, asking Tsitsipas if he was going to commit. That day, Tsitsipas did.Tsitsipas knows the advantages of the two-handed backhand. Safer shot, easier to control. But he isn’t about to quit the one-hander. He wants to be like Federer, in every way, and Sampras, too.“I’m here to kind of not have it die,” Tsitsipas said of the shot. “It kind of sits in my heart deeply because I really want to be like them.”Eubanks, too found it irresistible, and still does. “I just love it,” he said. “It just looked so good.”He took one hand off the racket one day at practice and tried not to pay attention to the coaches who might have been looking at him side-eyed, or making comments to his father, who was his primary coach. He told himself this shot was going to work for him, and he was stubborn about making sure it did.With the wisdom of age and a half-dozen years climbing his way into the top 100, plus time spent working as an analyst for the Tennis Channel, Eubanks is familiar with the shot’s drawbacks, especially the timing it requires, but he isn’t about to switch. “It’s a little too far gone,” he said. “Can’t quite do that now, not and win.” More

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      U.S. Open Draws Pave the Way for a Rematch of Djokovic vs. Alcaraz in Final

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      Novak Djokovic, the No. 2 seed, does not have an easy path to a 24th Grand Slam title, and neither does Iga Swiatek, the defending women’s champion.After a marathon match between Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz on Sunday in the final of the Western & Southern Open in Ohio, Djokovic said he hoped to play Alcaraz again at the U.S. Open “for the crowd.”The crowd may get to see that rematch.The men’s and women’s singles draws for the U.S. Open, which begins on Monday in New York, revealed the path for Djokovic and Alcaraz to meet again in the final, which would also be a rematch of last month’s Wimbledon final, a thrilling five-setter that Alcaraz won after nearly five hours on the court.“Every match we play against each other goes the distance,” Djokovic said after the final on Sunday, adding that the match felt like a Grand Slam.Djokovic returns to New York after missing the U.S. Open last year because he was unvaccinated against the coronavirus and travel restrictions would not allow him to enter the United States. Now, with an injured Rafael Nadal and a retired Roger Federer not in his way, Djokovic will seek his 24th Grand Slam title and his third of the season after winning in Australia and France earlier this year.Djokovic, who will play Alexandre Muller of France in the first round of the tournament, will not have an easy path to the final. He could potentially face the No. 7 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece in the quarterfinals, and in the semifinals, Djokovic could play Holger Rune of Denmark or Casper Ruud, the Norwegian who reached last year’s U.S. Open final.Alcaraz, who will face Dominik Koepfer of Germany in the first round, could also see some formidable opposition as he looks to defend his U.S. Open title. Alcaraz could play against Jannik Sinner of Italy in the quarterfinals, followed by one of two Russians, either Andrey Rublev or Daniil Medvedev, the 2021 U.S. Open champion.The women’s draw could also lead to several rivalries and rematches. Iga Swiatek, the No. 1 women’s player in the world, could end up in the final against Aryna Sabalenka, this year’s Australian Open champion.In defending her U.S. Open title, Swiatek could face Coco Gauff in the quarterfinals. Before this month, Swiatek had won seven matches against Gauff, but the 19-year-old American finally found a way to defeat Swiatek this month in the semifinals of the Western & Southern Open. Gauff went on to win the tournament for her first WTA 1000 title.On the other side of the draw, Sabalenka could play a quarterfinal match against Ons Jabeur, the Tunisian No. 5 seed who reached the U.S. Open final last year and lost in the Wimbledon final in July. In the semis, Sabalenka could meet either Caroline Garcia of France or Jessica Pegula, the American No. 3 seed.While both draws offer promising matchups, this year’s tournament will miss some big names: An injury has kept Nadal sidelined since the Australian Open, with hopes to return next year. Naomi Osaka, a two-time U.S. Open champion, will miss the tournament after giving birth to her daughter this summer, and Emma Raducanu, the 2021 U.S. Open champion, is out as she recovers from three minor procedures.Simona Halep, a two-time Grand Slam singles champion, was withdrawn from the tournament because of a provisional suspension she received last year after she tested positive for a performance-enhancing drug during the 2022 U.S. Open.This year’s U.S. Open will also miss trick shots from Nick Kyrgios, who withdrew from the tournament because of a wrist injury.But despite the notable absences, the tournament will open with some strong first-round matches: Tsitsipas, who lost to Djokovic in this year’s Australian Open final, will start off against Milos Raonic, a Wimbledon finalist in 2016. Venus Williams, the 43-year-old seven-time Grand Slam champion, will play Paula Badosa, who won at Indian Wells in 2021. And Sloane Stephens, the 2017 U.S. Open champion, will play in the first round against Beatriz Haddad Maia, a Brazilian player who has had a decent season, reaching the French Open semifinals this year and the round of 16 at Wimbledon. More

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      At Wimbledon, Is It Time for Hawk-Eye Live to Replace the Line Judges?

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      Line judges made incorrect calls in the first week that changed the trajectory of matches for Andy Murray, Bianca Andreescu and Venus Williams, among others. Is it time to give computers the job?Andy Murray was a victim.Bianca Andreescu was too.Jiri Lehecka had to play a fifth set and essentially win his third-round match twice.Hawk-Eye Live, an electronic line calling system, could have saved the players their set, even their match, but Wimbledon doesn’t use it to its full extent, preferring a more traditional approach. The rest of the year on the professional tours, many tournaments rely exclusively on the technology, allowing players to know with near certainty whether their ball lands in or out because the computer always makes the call.But when players come to the All England Club for what is widely regarded as the most important tournament of the year, their fates are largely determined by line judges relying on their eyesight. Even more frustrating, because Wimbledon and its television partners have access to the technology, which players can use to challenge a limited number of calls each match, everyone watching the broadcast sees in real time if a ball is in or out. The people for whom the information is most important — the players and the chair umpire, who oversees the match — must rely on the line judge.When the human eye is judging serves traveling around 120 m.p.h. and forehand rallies faster than 80 m.p.h., errors are bound to happen.“When mistakes are getting made in important moments, then obviously as a player you don’t want that,” said Murray, who could have won his second-round match against Stefanos Tsitsipas in the fourth set, if computers had been making the line calls. Murray’s backhand return was called out, even though replays showed the ball was in. He ended up losing in five sets.No tennis tournament clings to its traditions the way Wimbledon does. Grass court tennis. Matches on Centre Court beginning later than everywhere else, and after those in the Royal Box have had their lunch. No lights for outdoor tennis. A queue with an hourslong wait for last-minute tickets.Those traditions do not have an effect on the outcome of matches from one point to the next. But keeping line judges on the court, after technology has proved to be more reliable, has been affecting — perhaps even turning — key matches seemingly every other day.To understand why that is happening, it’s important to understand how tennis has ended up with different rules for judging across its tournaments.Before the early 2000s, tennis — like baseball, basketball, hockey and other sports — relied on human officials to make calls, many of which were wrong, according to John McEnroe (and pretty much every other tennis player). McEnroe’s most infamous meltdown happened at Wimbledon in 1981, prompted by an incorrect line call.“I would have loved to have had Hawk-Eye,” said Mats Wilander, the seven-time Grand Slam singles champion and a star in the 1980s.But then tennis began experimenting with the Hawk-Eye Live judging system. Cameras capture the bounce of every ball from multiple angles and computers analyze the images to depict the ball’s trajectory and impact points with only a microscopic margin for error. Line judges remained as a backup, but players received three opportunities each set to challenge a line call, and an extra challenge when a set went to a tiebreaker.That forced players to try to figure out when to risk using a challenge they might need on a more crucial point later in the set.“It’s too much,” Wilander said. “I can’t imagine making that calculation, standing there, thinking about whether a shot felt good, how many challenges I have left, how late is it in the set.”Even Roger Federer, who was good at nearly every aspect of tennis, was famously terrible at making successful challenges.Hawk-Eye Live cameras along the outer courts at the U.S. Open in 2020.Jason Szenes/EPA, via ShutterstockBefore long, tennis officials began considering a fully electronic line calling system. When the Covid-19 pandemic hit, tournaments were looking for ways to limit the number of people on the tennis court.Craig Tiley, the chief executive of Tennis Australia, said adopting electronic calling in 2021 was also a part of the Australian Open’s “culture of innovation.” Players liked it. So did fans, Tiley said, because matches moved more quickly.Last year, the U.S. Open switched to fully electronic line calling. There is an ongoing debate about whether the raised lines on clay courts would prevent the technology from providing the same precision as on grass and hardcourts. At the French Open and other clay court tournaments, the ball leaves a mark that umpires often inspect.In 2022, the men’s ATP Tour featured 21 tournaments with fully electronic line calling, including stops in Indian Wells, Calif.; Miami Gardens, Fla.; Canada; and Washington, D.C. All of those sites have women’s WTA tournaments as well. Every ATP tournament will use it beginning in 2025.“The question is not whether it’s 100 percent right but whether it is better than a human, and it is definitely better than a human,” said Mark Ein, who owns the Citi Open in Washington, D.C.A spokesman for the All England Club said Sunday that Wimbledon has no plans to remove its line judges.“After the tournament we look at everything we do, but at this moment, we have no plans to change the system,” Dominic Foster said.Line judges at Wimbledon are responsible for ruling the ball in or out.Julian Finney/Getty ImagesOn Saturday, Andreescu became a casualty of human error. The 2019 U.S. Open champion from Canada, Andreescu has been going deeper into Grand Slam tournaments after years of injuries.With the finish of her match against Ons Jabeur of Tunisia in sight, Andreescu resisted asking for electronic intervention on a crucial shot the line judge had called out. From across the net Jabeur, who had been close to the ball as it landed, advised Andreescu not to waste one of her three challenges for the set, saying the ball was indeed out. The match continued, though not before television viewers saw the computerized replay that showed the ball landing on the line.“I trust Ons,” Andreescu said after Jabeur came back to beat her in three sets, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4.Andreescu explained that she was thinking of her previous match, a three-set marathon decided by a final-set tiebreaker, during which she said she “wasted” several challenges.Against Jabeur, she thought, “I’m going to save it, just in case.”Bad idea. Jabeur won that game, and the set, and then the match.Over on Court No. 12, the challenge system was causing another kind of confusion. Lehecka had match point against Tommy Paul when he raised his hand to challenge a call after returning a shot from Paul that had landed on the line. His request for a challenge came just as Paul hit the next shot into the net.The point was replayed. Paul won it, and then the set moments later, forcing a deciding set. Lehecka won, but had to run around for another half-hour. Venus Williams lost match point in her first-round match on another complicated sequence involving a challenge.Leylah Fernandez, a two-time Grand Slam finalist from Canada, said she likes the tradition of line judges at Wimbledon as the world cedes more to technology.Then again, she added, if “it did cost me a match, it would have been probably a different answer.”Andy Murray learned after his loss to Stefanos Tsitsipas that his shot, called out by a line judge, was in and could have changed the outcome of the match.Sebastien Bozon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThat is where Murray, the two-time Wimbledon champion, found himself after his loss Friday afternoon. By the time he arrived at his news conference, he had learned that his slow and sharply angled backhand return of serve that landed just a few yards from the umpire had nicked the line.The point would have given him two chances to break Tsitsipas’s serve and serve out the match. When he was told the shot was in, his eyes opened with a startle, then fell toward the floor.Murray now knew what everyone else had seen.The ball had landed under the nose of the umpire, who confirmed the call, Murray said. He could not imagine how anyone could have missed it. He actually likes having the line judges, he added. Perhaps it was his fault for not using a challenge.“Ultimately,” he said, “the umpire made a poor call that’s right in front of her.” More

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      Andy Murray’s Run at Wimbledon Is Short and Bittersweet

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      In a punishing second-round match played over two days, Stefanos Tsitsipas outlasted Wimbledon’s favorite son over five sets.Streams of glum British tennis fans filed quietly out of Centre Court on Friday, moments after their Scottish hero had himself departed with a quick two-handed wave before disappearing from their sight.Andy Murray, a two-time Wimbledon champion who has extended his career to age 36 after two hip surgeries, was battling to extend his run at the All England Club into the third round, and was carrying most of the 15,000 fans in the stadium along for the ride.As the match against Stefanos Tsitsipas played out over two days, Murray’s supporters shrieked at his better moments, sat hushed for the lesser ones and cheered supportively ahead of critical points, hoping to provide him with the emotional lift needed to propel his weary body onward, knowing there is always a chance they may never see him compete at Wimbledon again.But the task over five punishing sets was too formidable, and the result cast a gloom over an otherwise glorious day of sunshine and tennis at Wimbledon.Murray, still striving to regain the consistently elite form he once possessed, fell to No. 5 Tsitsipas, 7-6 (3), 6-7 (2), 4-6, 7-6 (3), 6-4, in a match so close that Murray outscored his Greek opponent in overall points, 176-169.“I’m obviously very disappointed right now,” he said in a news conference about 25 minutes after the match had ended. “You never know how many opportunities you’re going to get to play here.”Murray’s dreary mood was reflected all around the grounds on a difficult day for British players and their fans on Friday. The 12th-seeded Cameron Norrie, Britain’s current No. 1 player, lost to the unseeded American Chris Eubanks, 6-3, 3-6, 6-2, 7-6 (3), on Court No. 1, and Liam Broady, the British No. 2, fell to the Canadian Dennis Shapovalov, who won 4-6, 6-2, 7-5, 7-5.But with Murray, it is different. For two decades, British tennis supporters have watched while he converted the promise of his junior career into glory when, under great pressure in 2013, he became the first British man in 77 years to win Wimbledon, Britain’s home tournament and the premier event on the tour. Three years later, he did it again, to add to the U.S. Open title and the Olympic gold medal he had won in 2012, the latter also on Centre Court.Stefanos Tsitsipas hugged Murray after their match.Shaun Botterill/Getty ImagesHe has been No. 1 in the world, and good enough for long enough to have earned membership among the “Big Four” of men’s tennis that also included the now-retired Roger Federer, the currently injured Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic, the current No. 1, who beat Stan Wawrinka on Friday on Centre Court, 6-3, 6-1, 7-6 (5).Murray’s presence on the lush green lawns of Wimbledon could barely have been expected four years ago. He underwent hip surgery in 2018 that did not take, and it appeared his career was done. But a year later he underwent hip-resurfacing surgery that allowed him to play on. It has not been easy. He has toiled on tennis’s minor league Challenger circuit and worked his world ranking to No. 40 going into Wimbledon. But recent losses in the first rounds of most of the top-flight tournaments he entered have raised doubts.Still, his public held out hope, and did its part, beginning Thursday night, when Murray and Tsitsipas began the match. When Murray won the second set in a tiebreaker, fans erupted, and optimism was rebooted. An energized Murray then had a set point in the third set, but fell to the grass in pain, yelling and clutching at the top of his right leg. It appeared serious, but he struggled to his feet, danced it out at the baseline and then served a winner to take the set as the crowd erupted.“It’s like sort of a jarring of the joint,” he said. “Can be a little bit sore.”It was 10:40 p.m., under the lights. As Murray and Tsitsipas went to their chairs for the changeover, they were informed that the match would be suspended because of the 11 p.m. curfew. Murray was riding a locomotive of momentum, but he could not argue — even though, before the tournament began, he had requested not to be scheduled for late matches.In a post-loss moment of magnanimity that many other professionals could not have mustered, Murray did not fault the decision, noting the grander implications.“The players shouldn’t necessarily just be able to make requests and get what they want,” he said. “There’s many, many factors that go into it.”On Friday, some conditions were completely different. The roof was open; the sun shone in. But the crowd was still as vociferous, both in the stadium and on Henman Hill, where many hundreds of fans baked in the sun to watch on the large video screen.Murray arrived at Wimbledon hoping it would be his breakthrough event, and he would make a bold run into the second week. With so few opportunities left to play in this hallowed venue, Murray was asked if the loss hurt even more, after all the struggles he has been through to get here. He paused and thought.“Yeah, the defeats maybe feel a bit tougher,” he said. “But, to be honest, every year that Wimbledon has not gone how I would like, it’s been hard.”He has given no indication that he intends to retire in the coming months. But decisions are sometimes made in the wake of a particularly dispiriting loss, and Murray, in his low, brooding tone, said he could not be certain.“Motivation is obviously a big thing,” he explained. “Continuing having early losses in tournaments like this don’t necessarily help with that.” More

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      French Open Quarterfinalist Tsitsipas Takes On Doubles, With His Brother

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      Tsitsipas is aiming to beat Carlos Alcaraz in Paris on Tuesday in a French Open quarterfinal, but what he really wants is to help turn his younger brother Petros into a doubles champion.Stefanos Tsitsipas already had a lot going on as he arrived at the French Open.He was trying to reach the level of the Grand Slam champions who came before him, like Novak Djokovic, who has beaten Tsitsipas in two major tournament finals, when he suddenly had to defend an attack from the sport’s young stars, led by Carlos Alcaraz, a 20-year-old Spaniard ranked No. 1 in the world. Tsitsipas, 24, has another priority, too — helping his younger brother Petros, 22, establish his own identity and become a top doubles player. They plan to play as many as nine events together this season, regardless of whether that helps Stefanos’s singles play, which Petros isn’t sure that it always does.“I don’t think I would have done this for anyone else,” Tsitsipas said last week, when his march toward his French Open quarterfinal showdown with Alcaraz on Tuesday was still two wins away. “This is our dream.”Tennis has always been the ultimate family affair for the Tsitsipas clan. The mother, Julia Salnikova Apostoli, was a top Russian player in the 1980s and was once the world’s best junior. The father, Apostolos, is also a seasoned player, though not a former top touring pro. He trained as a coach and a line judge and now coaches Stefanos, though does not meddle much when his sons are playing together.There are two other tennis-playing Tsitsipas siblings, Pavlos, 17, and Elisavet, 15.Too much family involvement can have its hazards in tennis, as the Tsitsipas family demonstrated at the Italian Open last month, when both of Stefanos’s parents were talking to him during his match against Daniil Medvedev of Russia. After Julia spoke to him in Russian, giving him instructions that Medvedev could easily hear and understand, Stefanos used some salty language and ordered her from his courtside box, which caused a mini scandal in Greece. He declined to comment on the matter upon his arrival in Paris.Stefanos Tsitsipas with his father, Apostolos, who is also his coach, after winning the Monte-Carlo Masters in 2022.Denis Balibouse/ReutersFor the moment, his relationship with Petros is far less fraught. But navigating it all with a tennis racket, especially when the activity dominates a family’s life, requires its own set of skills, particularly when one sibling’s talent evolves in a way the other’s does not, which is almost inevitably the case in tennis.Early last year, after much time and too many losses on tennis’s back roads, Petros Tsitsipas made a big decision — it was time to stop trying to make it as a singles player like his big brother and make doubles his game. There was more than tennis involved with the move. He was 21 and coming off an injury, with a singles ranking in the 700s. The time had come for Petros to forge his own identity and stop struggling through the lowest level tournaments — “making it through the jungle,” as he described it last week at Roland Garros.Doubles offered a path of less resistance. Good players who can’t hang near or with the most elite players on the tour and are game to learn doubles’ unique angles, quirks and strategies can earn a decent living. They just have to be willing to compete for far less prize money as the undercard or late-night programming at tournaments, especially when they are climbing the ladder.Petros Tsitsipas and Stefanos Tsitsipas lost their first-round doubles match at the 2023 French Open. They hop to play together at Wimbledon and the U.S. Open.Clive Mason/Getty ImagesThis is where Stefanos comes in handy. Because of his high singles ranking (currently No. 5), the Tsitsipas brothers can get into big-time tournaments that Petros might not have qualified for with a lower-ranked partner. Also, given Stefanos’s star power, tournament organizers are more likely to offer them a wild-card entry into the doubles draw.That said, for Petros to climb the doubles rankings in a way he was not able to in singles, he has to play more than just eight or nine times a year with Stefanos, to learn the game and win as much possible. Lately, when his older brother has not been available, he has been playing in tournaments on the Challenger tour with Sander Arends, a 31-year-old from the Netherlands who never cracked the top 1,000 in singles but is ranked 98th in doubles. Last year, Petros had a different teammate nearly every week. He has climbed to 115th in the rankings, from below 400 two years ago.“It’s like learning to play chess,” Petros said.He can find an easy role model across the locker room. Jamie Murray spent years trying to be known as something besides the brother of Andy Murray, who in 2013 became the first man from Britain in 77 years to win Wimbledon.Jamie Murray said he still hears people say, “That’s Andy Murray’s brother” when he walks around the grounds of a tennis tournament, something he learned to accept years ago.“No point to fighting it,” he said.But Murray said he sensed that people stopped thinking of him as a sibling of someone better at his sport than he was after 2016. All it took was pairing with his brother to win the Davis Cup and becoming the world’s top-ranked doubles player — the same year his brother became the top-ranked singles player.Now he sees Petros trying to accomplish the same thing, to make his own way with people looking at him mostly as just someone’s brother.“It’s not easy,” he said.Andy Murray, left, and Jamie Murray had banner years in 2016, with Andy achieving a No. 1 ranking in singles and Jamie topping the doubles chart. They also won a Davis Cup together.Clive Brunskill/Getty ImagesWhen Petros is playing with Stefanos rather than with a specialist, doubles feels like a different game, Petros said. The specialist may be better at doubles than Stefanos but he is not nearly as good a tennis player. With a specialist, the game is all about tactics and strategy. With Stefanos — as with any great singles player — it’s all about feel and improvisation.“More freelance,” Petros said, like the difference between playing sheet music or jamming with a uniquely gifted musician who thrives on spontaneity.It used to be accepted as conventional wisdom that playing doubles improves the singles game, keeping reflexes sharp and the mind focused throughout a big tournament. Petros isn’t so sure that is always true, especially with the increasingly physical grind that singles has become and how different the quick rallies of doubles are from the baseline battles of singles.That has not been an issue at the French Open. The Tsitsipas brothers lost a heartbreaking first-round match in a third-set tiebreaker.“Trust me, it sucks,” Stefanos said the next day. “To be losing that with your brother, it sucks more than usual.”Stefanos Tsitsipas has lost only one set in singles at this year’s French Open.James Hill for The New York TimesThere is no turning back now, though. As long as Stefanos is not too worn out from a deep run at the French Open, the brothers hope to play Wimbledon, where men’s doubles will be best-of-three sets this year instead of best of five. From there, they also want to play the summer tournaments in North America, including the U.S. Open.Petros has worked so hard, Stefanos said. He wants to help him get as far as he can.“I just want to go for it,” Stefanos said.They want to represent Greece in the Olympics, and win the Davis Cup.“Doing that with your brother is probably the most beautiful thing you can witness on a tennis court,” he said.First though, he has another matter to contend with: Alcaraz in the French Open singles quarterfinals. More

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      Novak Djokovic Captures His 10th Australian Open Men’s Singles Title

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      After missing last year’s tournament when he was deported for being unvaccinated for Covid-19, the Serb beat Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece in straight sets to win his 22nd Grand Slam title.MELBOURNE, Australia — Novak Djokovic came to Australia with a mission, or, really, a series of them.To win the championship he had won nine times once more. To win a 22nd Grand Slam men’s singles title and draw even with his rival Rafael Nadal at the top of that list. To remove any doubt anyone might have about whether he remains the world’s dominant player, the most commanding player of the last decade and now this one, too. To show the world that the only way to keep him from winning nearly any tennis tournament is to not let him play.Check. Check. Check. And check.A year after Australia deported him over his refusal to be vaccinated against Covid-19, Djokovic reclaimed the Grand Slam title he has won more than any other, capturing a record 10th championship at the Australian Open by beating Stefanos Tsitsipas, 6-3, 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5), on Sunday.After one last forehand off Tsitsipas’s racket floated long to end a match that felt lopsided despite the two tiebreakers, Djokovic turned and stared at his family and coaches sitting in his box. He pointed to his head, his heart and then just below his waistband, letting the world in on his team’s code language and telling it that winning on Sunday took everything he had.“It takes a big heart, mental strength and the other thing as well,” he said with a laugh once the night had turned into early morning.He wore a jacket emblazoned with a bright No. 22 just under the right side of his collarbone and called this triumph “the biggest victory of my life.”The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam event ran from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Coaching That Feels Like ‘Cheating’: In-match coaching has always happened on the sly, but this year is the first time the Australian Open has allowed players to be coached from the stands.Rod Laver Likes What He Sees: At 84 years old, the man with his name on the stadium sits courtside at the Australian Open.India’s Superstar: Sania Mirza, who leaves tennis as a sleeping giant, has been a trailblazer nonetheless. “I would like to have a quieter life,” she said.Behind the Scenes: A coterie of billionaires, deep-pocketed companies and star players has engaged for months in a high-stakes battle to lead what they view as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to disrupt the sport.In addition to gaining pole position to surge past the injured star Nadal on the career Grand Slam list — and in the GOAT debate — Djokovic also reclaimed the top spot in the world rankings, making him, at 35, the second-oldest player to reach that rarefied realm, behind only Roger Federer, who was nearly 37 during his last stint on top of the tennis world. Djokovic turns 36 on May 22. It’s probably a bad idea to bet against his taking that record from Federer, as he has so many others.The feat is even more noteworthy given how much tennis Djokovic has had to miss in the last year. He cannot play in the United States because of his refusal to get a Covid-19 shot. Unless there is a change in that policy, he will again miss a major tournament in Indian Wells, Calif., in March and the hardcourts swing this summer, which includes the U.S. Open.He is either stubborn or a man of principle — and more likely both.Djokovic’s score sheets in this tournament might suggest that these last two weeks were little more than a vacation with some tennis thrown in. He dropped only a single set in seven matches. His fourth-round, quarterfinal and semifinal tests were nearly complete wipeouts of opponents.Djokovic called the triumph “the biggest victory of my life.”Loren Elliott/ReutersWhen Djokovic is on, as he was in the second week of this tournament, his game is all about firsts. Line-scraping first serves that give him the first point of his service games. First breaks of his opponents’ serves that become an initial dagger, and first-set wins for a player who rarely lets anyone creep back into a match.He does not let opponents catch their breath, smacking returns at their shins, forcing them to hit yet another shot, and then another one, after they think they have won a point. It’s tennis as a form of suffocation. Tommy Paul, the American who lost to Djokovic in the semifinals, said when it was over that much of the first set had been a blur. Paul has played tennis his whole life, but this time the seconds between points, between the moment he hit a ball and the moment he was on the run chasing the next one, had never passed so quickly.Andrey Rublev, a Russian with a fearsome forehand and serve, paced in the hallway in the minutes before being called onto the court to play him in the quarterfinals. In the fourth round, Alex de Minaur, playing in front of a hometown crowd ready to cheer him into battle, won just five games. After demolishing de Minaur, Djokovic said to the Serbian press that playing against an Australian in Australia had motivated him because of what the country’s government had done to him last year, detaining and deporting him because of his notoriety and his stance against mandated vaccinations.But Djokovic’s reclamation mission in Australia was filled with hazards. Ahead of the tournament, he aggravated his hamstring. It forced him to take the court wearing a thick strapping around the injured area until the final. He hobbled through the first week, playing without the magical movement that is the foundation of his game.Goran Ivanisevic, Djokovic’s coach, said 97 percent of players would have pulled out of the tournament.“He is from outer space,” Ivanisevic said of Djokovic, who became even more aggressive because of his injury, smacking his forehand whenever he saw a chance to end a point quickly. “His brain is working different.”And then, as with so many of his previous injuries, a combination of rest, massages and painkillers made the pain and discomfort go away when it mattered most. He heard the noise on social media questioning whether the leg had ever been hurt at all, and shot back that no one ever questioned the validity of other players’ injuries — an unsubtle reference to the always banged-up Nadal.Then, just as he was hitting top speed, his father, Srdjan, was caught on video taking a picture with fans outside Rod Laver Arena, some of whom were holding Russian flags, after Djokovic’s win in the quarterfinals. Serbia and Russia have close political and cultural ties. Tennis crowds outside Serbia almost always arrive with some hostility for Djokovic, and they pull hard for his opponents, who are usually underdogs.Djokovic dealt with Paul and then dealt with the public, assuring everyone that his father had never meant to show support for the war in Ukraine, that as someone who grew up in the war-torn Balkans he knew the horrors of violent conflict and would never support it.After that, only Tsitsipas, for years seen as tennis’s heir apparent, stood in his way. Tsitsipas was completely overwhelmed by Djokovic in the final.James Ross/EPA, via ShutterstockMaybe Sunday night in Australia, where the large, spirited Greek population has turned Tsitsipas into an adopted son, would be the night, especially with the No. 1 ranking on the line.Then again, maybe not. Tsitsipas came out without the ease and fluidity that he had played with for nearly two weeks, and he fell behind early. Djokovic barely seemed to break a sweat as he took the first set.In the second set, though, Tsitsipas’s arm seemed to loosen, the forehands started to bang and the windmill one-hand backhands started to whip.This will undoubtedly be the hour that keeps Tsitsipas up at night in the coming weeks. The netted volley that would have given him a chance to break Djokovic’s serve at 4-3. The tentative return of Djokovic’s meatball of a second serve when Tsitsipas had set point. The long forehand and the loose backhand — the stroke Djokovic picked on all night that gave him the edge he would not give up in the tiebreaker.“He’s the greatest that has ever held a tennis racket,” Tsitsipas said of Djokovic as he held his runner-up plate once more.Djokovic is the game’s best front-runner, winning roughly 95 percent of the matches in which he wins the first set. He has lost a two-set lead only once, 13 years ago.They traded service breaks in the first two games of the third set, and then traded service games until yet another tiebreaker. Like the match itself, this one was not nearly as close as the final numbers. Tsitsipas sprayed his shots long and into the net, allowing Djokovic to grab a 5-0 lead.And while Tsitsipas made it close, winning five of the next six points, as Djokovic tightened his game and Tsitsipas swung his racket with nothing to lose, there was little question how this would end — only when. More

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      Novak Djokovic Comes Full Circle at the Australian Open

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      Deported a year ago and unable to play in 2022’s first Grand Slam tournament, Djokovic deeply felt this major title, his 22nd, calling it “a huge relief.”MELBOURNE, Australia — It felt like a full-circle occasion as Novak Djokovic celebrated on Sunday in the same city where he had been deported on a Sunday little more than a year ago.It felt like a cycle was ending. With the Australian Open title and the No. 1 ranking back in his possession, he cried in a way that he had never cried before at Melbourne Park or perhaps at any tournament: with big, loud, body-wrenching sobs as he lay on his back in the players’ box after embracing his family and team and then dropping to the ground, overcome by it all.When he finally returned to his feet and then to his courtside seat, he buried his face in a white towel and sobbed some more.“I just felt this huge burden off my back with everything we’ve been through,” he said. “It was a huge relief, and a huge release as well.”Djokovic has experienced no shortage of powerful sensations in Rod Laver Arena: the coming-of-age giddiness of winning his first Grand Slam singles title in 2008; the sweet misery of winning the longest major singles final in history in 2012 over Rafael Nadal, a 5-hour-53-minute test that left both combatants too weary to stand for the awards ceremony.But Sunday will surely occupy a category apart. Not for the final itself — a relatively straightforward 6-3, 7-6 (4), 7-6 (5) victory over Stefanos Tsitsipas — but for all that led to it and how Djokovic reacted.“He’s keeping everything inside,” Goran Ivanisevic, his coach, said. “Sometimes you have to explode.”Djokovic’s decision not to be vaccinated for the coronavirus has had big consequences, and returning to Australia after his forced exit on the eve of last year’s Australian Open would have been plenty to process on its own. But then came the left hamstring injury that caused Djokovic to hobble at times during the early rounds.Ivanisevic said “97 percent” of players would have withdrawn from the tournament if they had received magnetic resonance imaging test results that looked like Djokovic’s.“But not him; he is from outer space,” said Ivanisevic, pointing a finger to his temple. “His brain is working different.”The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam event runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Coaching That Feels Like ‘Cheating’: In-match coaching has always happened on the sly, but this year is the first time the Australian Open has allowed players to be coached from the stands.Rod Laver Likes What He Sees: At 84 years old, the man with his name on the stadium sits courtside at the Australian Open.India’s Superstar: Sania Mirza, who leaves tennis as a sleeping giant, has been a trailblazer nonetheless. “I would like to have a quieter life,” she said.Behind the Scenes: A coterie of billionaires, deep-pocketed companies and star players has engaged for months in a high-stakes battle to lead what they view as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to disrupt the sport.Djokovic, who said he would have withdrawn if this were not a Grand Slam tournament, said he did not practice on any of the off days. He followed the same template in 2021 when he won the title after tearing an abdominal muscle. This time, he also required extensive therapy.“Look, a lot of people doubted and still doubt that I was injured,” he said, explaining that he would provide evidence at some stage. “But again, I don’t feel I need to prove anything to anyone. But it did affect me, especially in the first week. From the fourth round onwards, I felt like it was behind me.”Then came the latest controversy sparked by his father, Srdjan, who posed for photos with flag-carrying Russian supporters inside Melbourne Park after Djokovic’s quarterfinal defeat of the Russian Andrey Rublev on Wednesday.Djokovic explained that his father had intended to celebrate with Serbian fans as he had been doing throughout the tournament. But it was Djokovic who was left to address the incident with tournament officials and to explain it directly to the news media.“It required an enormous mental energy really to stay present, to stay focused, to take things day by day and really see how far I can go,” Djokovic said.Stefanos Tsitsipas, left, and Djokovic, during the trophy ceremony.Loren Elliott/ReutersBut it hardly affected the bottom line. He did not lose a set in the semifinal against Tommy Paul, an unseeded American, or in the final against Tsitsipas, the shaggy-haired, 24-year-old Greek star who beat Djokovic in two of their first three matches but has now lost to him 10 times in a row.On Sunday, Tsitsipas’s best shot, the forehand, too often cracked under Djokovic’s pressure, and sometimes it seemed as if it cracked simply at the prospect of Djokovic’s pressure. But Tsitsipas, who would have become No. 1 for the first time with a first major title, did not look quite as crestfallen as he did after losing a two-set lead to Djokovic in the 2021 French Open final.“Paris was heartbreaking,” he said.Instead, whether he realized it or not, he tried to take a page on Sunday night from Djokovic’s early-career playbook: when the Serb was getting beaten repeatedly by more established champions like Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal. Despite the frustration and dejection, Djokovic came to see playing his accomplished rivals as an opportunity to get the most out of himself.“Novak is a player that pushes you to your limits,” Tsitsipas said. “I don’t see this as a curse. I don’t see this as something, like, annoying. This is very good for the sport, to have competitors like him, to have champions like him. He’s very important for us that want to get to his point one day.”This seems the smart approach rather than stewing in negativity. But the reality for Tsitsipas is that Djokovic won that first Grand Slam title in 2008 in Melbourne at age 20 and won four more majors before he turned 25. And however full circle it all felt in Melbourne on Sunday night, Djokovic is hardly done searching for more titles, more ways to win.He and Nadal, who won the Australian Open in Djokovic’s absence last year, are back in a tie with 22 Grand Slam singles titles apiece. Djokovic wants the lead and as many majors as he can get before time and younger men inevitably deprive him of the opportunity.Like Federer, whose wife Mirka’s support on the home front and on the road with their young children allowed him to compete successfully on tour into his late 30s, Djokovic’s wife, Jelena, is giving him the same flexibility with their young son and daughter. Unvaccinated for the coronavirus, he is still unable to enter the United States at this stage but said he hoped a change in policy would allow him to enter in time to play at Indian Wells, Calif., in March.“I still have lots of motivation; let’s see how far it takes me,” he said. “I don’t know how many more years I’m going to play or how many more Slams I’m going to play. It depends on various things. It doesn’t depend only on my body.“I think it’s extremely important for me to first have the support and love from the close ones and the ability to go and play and keep the balance with the private life. But at the same time have the mental clarity or — how should I say — aspirations to really strive to chase these trophies. Physically I can keep myself fit. Of course, 35 is not 25, even though I want to believe it is. But I still feel there is time ahead of me.”Djokovic’s let out a scream, and also sobbed, after winning the men’s singles final on Sunday.Lintao Zhang/Getty ImagesFederer, 41, retired last September, and Nadal, 36, no doubt remains a threat when healthy but is out of action again for at least several weeks, this time with the hip injury that contributed to his losing in the second round to Mackenzie McDonald.Ivanisevic expects Nadal back in force in the spring for the clay-court season that culminates with the French Open, which Nadal has won a mind-bending 14 times, more than any player has won any Grand Slam tournament.“What I feel Nadal and I do, what we still fight for and what still motivates us the most is winning the biggest titles in our sport and keeping up with the young guns,” Djokovic said. “I think tennis is in good hands with great characters, great personalities and great players, but we’re still not going anywhere.”Djokovic has now joined Nadal in the double-digit club at a major tournament with his 10th Australian Open title.It has been and remains quite a duel, elevating and at times exhausting both men. Chasing excellence is hard enough; chasing it through adversity, whatever its provenance, is harder still.Though Djokovic, with his supreme timing and elastic movement, can make a difficult game look easy, his emotions in the aftermath on Sunday made it clear how challenging this tournament and this cycle have been. A little more than a year ago, he and Ivanisevic were at Melbourne Airport, being escorted to their plane out of the country.Now, Djokovic is back on top Down Under.“I would say this is probably the biggest victory of my life, considering the circumstances,” he said, the Australian Open trophy back in very familiar hands. More

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      Why Coaching From the Stands in Tennis Can Feel Like ‘Cheating’

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      In-match coaching has always happened on the sly, but this year is the first time the Australian Open has allowed players to be coached from the stands.MELBOURNE, Australia — It has been an Australian Open full of progress and positive energy for Dean Goldfine, the traveling coach of the fast-rising American Ben Shelton, a surprise quarterfinalist in his first trip abroad.But Goldfine has also felt pangs of guilt. This is the first Australian Open, and only the second Grand Slam tournament, in which coaches have been allowed to communicate with players during matches from the stands, and that has made him uncomfortable.“Sometimes when I’m out there, when it’s happening, when I’m saying stuff, it’s like I want to look around and over my shoulder, because I feel like I’m cheating,” he said last week.Goldfine, 57, has been coaching on tour for more than 30 years. But in-match coaching had until recently been banned at all men’s tournaments, and at all four major tournaments for both women and men.The game is now in the midst of a quiet revolution. The women’s tour, outside of the Grand Slams, has allowed various forms of in-match coaching since 2008, and the men’s tour began allowing it last July from the stands for a trial period that included the 2022 U.S. Open, which was the first Grand Slam tournament to permit the practice.The Australian Open has followed that lead, and the other two major tournaments — the French Open and Wimbledon — are set to take part in the trial this year.Wimbledon’s leadership has long been the most vehement opponent of in-match coaching. Richard Lewis, the former chief executive of the All England Club, which runs the event, argued for the virtues of a “gladiatorial” contest in which players were required to problem-solve under pressure on their own.That remains an appealing concept to many players, spectators and even some coaches.“I’m against the coaching,” Goldfine said. “Just because for me that’s one of the unique things about our sport. It just takes away a big part of our game, which is the player out there, dealing with what’s going on and understanding it and being able to make adjustments and being able to deal with their emotions also.”Goldfine brought up Goran Ivanisevic, the mercurial Croatian star with the huge serve who did finally win Wimbledon in 2001 but had long struggled to bear down, block out distractions and play his best in big moments.“Imagine if Goran would have had someone that really could get him to calm down during matches,” Goldfine said.The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam event runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Rod Laver Likes What He Sees: At 84 years old, the man with his name on the stadium sits courtside at the Australian Open.India’s Superstar: Sania Mirza, who leaves tennis as a sleeping giant, has been a trailblazer nonetheless. “I would like to have a quieter life,” she said after the mixed doubles final.Behind the Scenes: A coterie of billionaires, deep-pocketed companies and star players has engaged for months in a high-stakes battle to lead what they view as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to disrupt the sport.Endless Games: As matches stretch into the early-morning hours, players have grown concerned for their health and performance.The rule has been a point of difference for tennis, which has been the rare major sport to forbid coaching during play (consider all those soccer and basketball coaches hollering instructions and all those caddies chattering in golfers’ ears).But the tide appears to have turned in earnest. Roger Federer, the Swiss superstar long opposed to the concept, has retired. Wimbledon has new leadership and has joined the experiment, which is feeling less and less like a trial and more and more like policy.Stefano Vukov, Elena Rybakina’s coach, shouted from the player’s box during her women’s singles semifinal match against Victoria Azarenka.Martin Keep/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe main arguments in favor are that the interaction between coaches and players provides entertainment value, improves the quality of play and reflects the pro game’s shift to more of a team concept. Singles stars are relying on larger staffs, including physiotherapists, trainers, performance psychologists and, in the case of Rafael Nadal, sometimes as many as three coaches.Perhaps the most crucial argument is that allowing in-match coaching eliminates hypocrisy, because many coaches were already breaking the no-coaching rule on the sly.“I was at different times doing it, and I’m sure everyone’s done it at some stage,” said Nicole Pratt, a retired Australian player who is now a leading coach. “I guess probably being English-speaking and because most of the umpires understood English, I felt like that was somewhat a disadvantage sometimes. So now it’s an even, level playing field, and to be honest, I love it. Because I do think it can be influential on a match, the information a player is given, although not always.”In the past, in-match coaching has often been delivered illegally through code words or hand signals, like the one used by Serena Williams’s coach Patrick Mouratoglou during the uproarious 2018 U.S. Open final against Naomi Osaka that led to Williams being penalized by the chair umpire. Williams argued that she was not being coached during play and did not “cheat to win.”The language barrier has not always been protective. Stefanos Tsitsipas, the Greek star who will face Novak Djokovic in the Australian Open final on Sunday, has long supported in-match coaching and has received numerous code violations for being coached by his father, Apostolos. Tournament officials have sometimes deployed Greek-speaking personnel to sit close to his father in the player’s box.Tsitsipas is delighted to see an end to the fines, at least for now. But above all, he is content to see the player-coach dialogue officially integrated into matches.“In my case, it has always been part of how I do things when I’m on the court,” Tsitsipas said on Friday. “I’m glad it’s not penalized now. That’s how it should be. I see no reason to have a coach with you if they can’t share some of their view and knowledge with you when you’re competing. I feel like it’s something very natural in our sport.”But in-match coaching is not necessarily a leveler. Top players can, in general, afford top coaches. Those lower down in the food chain usually cannot.“I worry about richer players getting richer,” said Jim Courier, the former No. 1 player who won the Australian Open twice. “I think about players who come down and play qualifying and cannot even travel with a coach and get in and go up against someone with four coaches.”Perhaps a data analyst would be a good hire at this stage. Many players now make use of analytics for scouting, paying for private services or using those provided by a national federation, like the United States Tennis Association. But for the coaching trial, the Australian Open is providing access to detailed in-match data, which is available on tablets in the player’s boxes at Rod Laver Arena and elsewhere on coaches’ smartphones or other devices.The data is compiled from information provided by Hawk-Eye Live, the electronic line-calling system, and tracks seemingly everything: players’ serve locations on routine points and pressure points; their ball-contact locations on the stroke following the serve; the percentage of balls they are hitting on the rise.“We knew we were going to have in-match coaching, which is great, but the question was how can we provide some support in an intuitive way,” said Machar Reid, the head of innovation at Tennis Australia.Stefanos Tsitsipas’s coaches — Mark Philippoussis, center, and his father, Apostolos Tsitsipas, right — watching his second-round match.Hannah Mckay/ReutersIt is quite a package and, for now, provides data only from matches in progress, not from an opponent’s prior matches. “This is all about in-match, and not so it can be used from a scouting point of view,” Reid said.Goldfine said the Tennis Australia package was “a lot to process” in real time, but he did pick out some data points to share with Shelton, a left-hander, during his quarterfinal defeat to Tommy Paul, a fellow American.“I did watch some of Tommy’s matches on Tennis TV, and in a couple of the lefty matches I watched, he served a fair amount of second serves to the forehand,” Goldfine said. “But against Ben, I noticed it was pretty much all backhand on the second serve. So that was one thing I did look at on the screen was serve locations, because for me, that’s big. So, I told Ben about halfway through the second set to sit on the backhand.”Goldfine offered much more advice to Shelton based on his own observations and instincts. The rules for the coaching trial allow for “a few words and/or short phrases,” but “no conversations are permitted.”How exactly do you define a conversation?“It’s a little ridiculous, just from that standpoint,” Goldfine said. “Just a big gray area.”What was clear to Goldfine and Shelton was that the coaching helped, perhaps all the more because Shelton, 20, is an inexperienced professional fresh out of college tennis, where in-match coaching is always permitted.“It’s been huge for Ben,” Goldfine said.It also provided entertainment when Paul, befuddled by Shelton’s big serve, turned to his coach, Brad Stine, to ask him which way Shelton might serve on the next point. Stine made a T with his fingers to indicate down the middle. Shelton, who had noticed their interaction, served wide instead, and everyone ended up grinning.The surprise is that the coaching trial has not changed the flow of the game much for spectators. It has provided some unsettling viewing — such as Elena Rybakina’s emotive coach Stefano Vukov admonishing her during matches — but it has generally gone unnoticed.The question remains whether in-match coaching provides enough payoff to justify changing a fundamental aspect of an individual sport. For now, tennis is leaning heavily toward the affirmative.“What I’m afraid of is that these young players will become dependent on their coaches,” Goldfine said. “And coaching for me is teaching, but having Ben experience it so he learns for himself, so he’s able to do these things on his own and figure things out. The last thing I want is my player to be dependent on me.” More

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      Djokovic Is Back in the Australian Open Final

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      Djokovic will play for his 22nd Grand Slam title on Sunday against Stefanos Tsitsipas. Will his father, Srdjan, be in his usual seat in the stands to cheer him on?MELBOURNE, Australia — For Novak Djokovic, everything was going according to plan. Even better than that, by many measures.He had charmed a country that had kicked him out a year ago over his refusal to be vaccinated. The soreness in his hamstring at the beginning of the tournament had all but disappeared, allowing him to look nearly invincible in the crucial second week of the tournament. He appeared on a glide pattern to yet another Australian Open men’s singles title and the 22nd Grand Slam title of his career.And then his father, Srdjan Djokovic troubled the waters.Djokovic, Serbia’s favorite son and most famous citizen, will play for his 10th Australian Open championship on Sunday against Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece, but the glide pattern is officially over. He defeated Tommy Paul in straight sets Friday, 7-5, 6-1, 6-2, in front of a hostile crowd that notably did not include his father, who has been at all his other matches during this tournament.Srdjan Djokovic on Thursday appeared in a video with fans outside Rod Laver Arena, some of whom were holding Russian flags, and next to a man wearing a shirt with the “Z” symbol that is viewed as support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, despite the tournament’s ban on Russian and Belarusian flags.Serbia has close political and cultural ties to Russia, and support for the Russian invasion is significant there, unlike in most of the rest of Europe. The incident made headlines worldwide, sparking the ire of Ukraine’s government and sending both the tournament and Djokovic’s team scrambling to control the damage.Early Friday, Srdjan Djokovic released a statement saying he had been celebrating with his son’s fans on Wednesday night and did not mean to cause an international incident. “My family has lived through the horror of war, and we wish only for peace,” the statement said. “So there is no disruption to tonight’s semifinal for my son or for the other player, I have chosen to watch from home.”The 2023 Australian OpenThe year’s first Grand Slam event runs from Jan. 16 to Jan. 29 in Melbourne.Coaching That Feels Like ‘Cheating’: In-match coaching has always happened on the sly, but this year is the first time the Australian Open has allowed players to be coached from the stands.Rod Laver Likes What He Sees: At 84 years old, the man with his name on the stadium sits courtside at the Australian Open.India’s Superstar: Sania Mirza, who leaves tennis as a sleeping giant, has been a trailblazer nonetheless. “I would like to have a quieter life,” she said.Behind the Scenes: A coterie of billionaires, deep-pocketed companies and star players has engaged for months in a high-stakes battle to lead what they view as a once-in-a-generation opportunity to disrupt the sport.Hours later, Tennis Australia, which had been criticized for not acting more swiftly to snuff out demonstrations that might incite violence, released its own statement, saying that it had worked with police to remove the demonstrators and spoken with players and their teams about the importance of not engaging in any activity that causes distress or disruption. The organization noted Srdjan Djokovic’s decision not to attend the match.“Tennis Australia stands with the call for peace and an end to war and violent conflict in Ukraine,” the statement said.After the match, Djokovic said his father’s actions had been misinterpreted, that he had no intention of offering support to Russia and the war.“We are against the war, we never will support any violence or any war,” he said. “We know how devastating that is for the family, for people in any country that is going through the war.”He said he and his father decided together that it would be best for him not to attend the semifinal but he hoped he would be there watching him in the final on Sunday.“It wasn’t pleasant not to have him in the box,” he said.Only Djokovic knows how the incident affected his play, but he was erratic early against Paul, the first-time Grand Slam semifinalist from the United States. Djokovic jumped out to an early 5-1 lead, but after he complained to the chair umpire about a fan who was harassing him he fell into a temporary funk. He dropped the next four games as the crowd rallied behind the American underdog and taunted the defending champion. Boos echoed through the stadium after Djokovic steadied himself to win the first set, 7-5.Djokovic responded by putting his hand to his ear and waving his hands as if to say, “bring it on,” which spurred the clumps of Serbian fans who attend Djokovic’s matches no matter where in the world he is playing to drown out the howls.Tsitsipas lost to Djokovic in the 2021 French Open finals after surrendering a two-set lead.Fazry Ismail/EPA, via ShutterstockThe atmosphere is likely to be even more spirited on Sunday against Tsitsipas, who is a local favorite because of Australia’s significant Greek population, among the largest in the world outside of Greece and the United States. It will be a rematch of the French Open final in 2021. There, Djokovic came back from two sets down to win his second French Open singles title.Tsitsipas has struggled to recover from that loss but has been playing arguably his best tennis since then at this tournament. Whoever wins will be the world’s top-ranked player.On Friday, he beat Karen Khachanov of Russia in four sets, 7-6 (2), 6-4, 6-7 (6), 6-3. At 4-4 in the second set, Tsitsipas turned a tight match, scrambling for a series of overheads and winning the 22-shot rally with a rolling forehand winner to break Khachanov’s serve, then clinched the set in the next game. Despite wobbling in the third set with the finish line in sight, Tsitsipas came out strong in the fourth set and cruised into his second Grand Slam final, a test he said he has never been more ready for, especially with the Greek-Australian Mark Philippoussis helping his father coach.“I just see no downside or negativity in what I’m trying to do out there,” he said after beating Khachanov. “Even if it doesn’t work, I’m very optimistic and positive about any outcome, any opponent that I have to face. This is something that has been sort of lacking in my game.”Djokovic has not struggled with internal negativity in years, with good reason. He has won four of the last six Grand Slams he has played and is often most dangerous when facing adversity. The negativity he has had to deal with is external, whether it’s criticism for his refusal to be vaccinated against Covid-19, or his requests that fans who try to disrupt him be removed from his matches, which has happened several times during this tournament.“It’s not pleasant for me to go through this with all the things that I had to deal with last year and this year in Australia,” he said. “It’s not something that I want or need.”There may be plenty of criticism at Sunday’s final. Chances are, Djokovic will be ready for it. More