Interview: Novak Djokovic
"Let's play!"
Sponsors weren't interested in a young Serb, even when he won junior
European titles, so Djokovic's parents had to rely on their extended
family for help. Perhaps that partly explains why Djokovic is so keen
to be an ambassador for his homeland. 'He always feels he needs to
act diplomatically,' says his coach, Marian Vajda. 'He loves his country.'
Age:
20
Ranking: 3
Career highlight: Beating the top three, Roddick, Nadal and
Federer, in consecutive days in August last year
Biggest disappointment: Limping out of his 2007 Wimbledon semi-final
against Rafael Nadal
Look out for: His powerful, angled forehand and his excellent
banter at press conferences
Men's tennis in 2007 was all about one man: Novak Djokovic. At the
start of the season, he was 19 years old and ranked 16th in the world.
By the time he left Wimbledon - stymied in the semis by foot blisters
- he was number three. But the moment that defined his stellar year
was not, surprisingly, a win. It was his appearance in the US Open
final, against Roger Federer, in September. Djokovic may have lost
the match, but the sight of Maria Sharapova screaming him on from
his guest box - with Robert De Niro alongside - confirmed he had something
that Federer, whatever blazer-and-trouser combos he may concoct, will
never be able to emulate: style.
For a sense of Djokovic's flair, you could watch his Wimbledon quarter-final
against Marcos Baghdatis, one of the most thrilling matches of the
year, despite being five hours long, or the attacking play that defeated
Federer in the final of the Montreal Masters in August. But that is
only half the story. For the rest, see Djokovic's YouTube moments:
his full-throated karaoke rendition of 'I Will Survive' at the French
Open; his on-court impersonations of his fellow players, from a crotch-fiddling
Nadal to a prancing Sharapova. Djokovic has charm and, crucially,
wit, and has taken it upon himself to be Serbia's most winning, and
most committed, ambassador to the world.
In his family's Belgrade office, in one of the city's ubiquitous concrete
blocks, the young man who is the family business offers drinks with
the kind of manners that would please your mum. I put it to Novak
Djokovic that with his sporting ability, the four languages he speaks
and the Monte Carlo second home, not to mention last year's $3.9m
prize money, he has to be the most eligible bachelor in Serbia right
now. He laughs. There have, it transpires, been a few phone calls
from hopeful mothers. 'Yes, that's one of the things that's happening
now,' he says with a smile. 'But it's just part of the success. I'm
happy, my family's happy, everything is going well.'
The evidence is around us. Djokovic's schedule for his three-day home
visit is full of public appearances and private meetings, and the
office is bustling. Uncles and cousins come and go, finalising arrangements
for a charity event at the Belgrade Arena - one of the largest indoor
stadiums in Europe - under the direction of Novak's dad Srdjan. Novak
will be playing a doubles exhibition match with Ana Ivanovic, Jelena
Jankovic and Janko Tipsarevic who have, in barely a year, effected
nothing less than a revolution in Serbian sport. Until their recent
successes, tennis ranked lower on the sporting consciousness here
than volleyball, handball and water polo. Now it is challenging football
and basketball as the country's most popular sport. Since the French
Open, the tennis federation has seen a 40 per cent increase in people
playing the sport and basketball courts are being hijacked by children
wanting to hit balls over an imaginary net.
'Football has always been big here, even though we never achieved
anything,' says Djokovic, who is a big fan of Red Star, the 1991 European
champions. 'I love football and it's the sport I would really like
to play. I've said on national television here that I would really
love to play for one of our football clubs when I finished my tennis
career. Everybody was surprised, but that's what I really want to
do. When I finish, who knows? A couple of games, or half a season.'
Is he any good? 'Yeah!' What kind of player? 'Attacking. I like to
score.' This makes sense: given his propensity to strip off his shirt
for tennis fans, he would particularly enjoy the celebrations.
Anyway, who has the best body in the men's dressing room? He pauses
to consider this quite seriously. 'Oh. Whooh. I would say, for sure,
Paradorn Srichaphan. He has not been playing and I haven't seen him
for a while. But he still has the best body in men's tennis.' Better
than Rafa? 'Rafa? No, no... I don't like bodies like Rafa's.'
I
ask if he has any bad habits. 'Breathing,' he replies. Er, right.
'It's something that's bothering me a bit. I still don't have the
right breathing on the court, exhaling when you're hitting the ball.
You lose a lot of energy if you're not breathing right. Maybe some
yoga would help.' In 2005 he had an operation to fix what he calls
a 'deviation' in his nose. Sounds weird. 'Yeah, it was! It was the
worst time in my life. I was in the hospital and for three days I
couldn't breathe because I had things in my nose, it was terrible.
But the surgeon was from Italy and he knows how to do the job really
well. He did nose surgery with Paolo Maldini and even Prime Minister
Berlusconi. So he's pretty famous there.' Those are some important
noses. Did he offer any, you know, shaping? 'Aesthetic wise? No, that
was something they didn't offer.'
More than a hundred journalists turn up to Novak's morning press conference.
With his white shirt tucked in to a pair of jeans, rimless glasses
and his earnest responses, he has the air not so much of a sportsman
as of a PhD student, or an accountant. Alongside him sit his two younger
brothers, teenager Marko and 12-year-old Djordje, both promising players.
Marko's shy, but little Djordje is not. When someone asks him who
his tennis idols are, he replies: 'I like players from the past like
Andre Agassi. But I like myself the best.'
Djokovic's own hero was, and remains, Pete Sampras, because, aged
six, it was Sampras he watched win Wimbledon in 1993, jump- starting
his love of the game. It is hard to imagine in what way punctilious
Pete might have inspired such an extrovert. Djokovic laughs. 'We're
totally opposite. Totally opposite personalities. Totally opposite
game. But I just love the way he deals with the pressure. He always
plays well, always serves well in the important moments. Mentally
he was the strongest person I've ever seen. I'm just really sad that
I still haven't had the chance to meet him. Maybe in the upcoming
season in the States I will.' What will he say when he finally does
meet him? 'I don't know... I'll probably say nothing for 10 minutes,
I'll be so confused. Then I'll say, "Let's play!"'
One player he has befriended - ever since they began competing - is
Andy Murray. You suspect they would make a pretty wild duo. 'Well,
we haven't partied too much,' says Djokovic, looking almost demure.
'But on the court you can see how we're both playing with a lot of
emotion. He screams a lot, and I throw rackets.' The pair have always
been closely compared in ability and potential; but over the past
year, while Djokovic has been fulfilling his, Murray has been left
nursing injuries and kicking the sofa. Does that make things awkward
between them? Novak looks momentarily sheepish. 'Actually, I lost
his number.'
Perhaps he has the gossip on what is happening between Jelena and
Andy's brother Jamie, who looked so cosy at last year's Wimbledon?
He grins. 'No. But as soon as I see Jelena today I'm going to ask
her what's going on. I heard she was denying everything, but I think
I saw them at the US Open together, so I don't know.' And speaking
of these things, what is the deal with him and Sharapova? 'There is
no deal,' he says, though he is clearly not offended at the question.
'Obviously when you see her sitting there in the final of the US Open
cheering for me you think, "What's going on?" But it's just
a nice friendship.'
By 5pm, Djokovic has changed into a velvety brown suit, far more befitting
his sex-symbol status, for Serbia's sports personality of the year
awards, held at one of Belgrade's slightly shabbier hotels. Apart
from a wrestler, a drag racer and a kayaking quartet, Djokovic's only
real competition for the title comes from Jankovic and Ivanovic. At
the buffet that follows her son's inevitable victory, his mum, Dijana,
talks about the tennis academy that the family is hoping to establish
in his name. 'The important thing is that the idols for young Serbs
now are very good kids,' she says. 'They are people who really worked
hard to get where they are now. They didn't steal, cheat, or kill
somebody to get there. For 10 years it was so bad. The role models
were gangsters, or drug dealers. Everything is changing.'
Afterwards, the Djokovic family head for dinner with one of their
own idols - Alberto Tomba, aka Tomba la Bomba, the legendary Italian
skier and multiple world champion. Djokovic's father Srdjan was a
skier for the former Yugoslavia, and his parents met on the piste;
throughout Novak's childhood they ran a pizza-and-pancakes restaurant
in the ski-resort town of Kapaonik. While most professional sportspeople
shun the slopes - because neither their coaches nor their insurance
companies like it - Novak still skis whenever he can. So which is
he: speed or style? 'I like to think it's a combination of both,'
he says. 'But I try to have more style. I like to look nice on the
skis.'
That Djokovic became a tennis player at all is something of a curiosity.
As well as inheriting skiing genes from his father, his mother's family
contained some serious volleyballing talent. 'Nobody actually played
tennis in my family,' he says. But as he watched four tennis courts
being built opposite the family restaurant, the five-year-old Djokovic
was enthralled. Jelena Gencic, who opened the tennis camp there, is
still coaching in her seventies; Djokovic often describes her as the
biggest tennis influence in his life. Gencic remembers the day he
first arrived to play. 'He arrived half an hour early with a big tennis
bag,' she says. 'Inside his bag I saw a tennis racket, towel, bottle
of water, banana, wrist-bands, everything you need for a game. I asked
him, "Who packed your bag, your mother?" He said, "No,
I packed it." He was only five. I said: "How did you know
what to pack?" And he said, "I watch TV."' His mum
Dijana says that even as a young boy he was a perfectionist. 'I always
tried to win,' Djokovic agrees. 'I was as competitive as I am today.'
It was his tennis routine that saw the family through during the Nato
bombing campaign in 1999. 'All our family were here in Belgrade during
the bombing, and all day we were on court,' Dijana says. 'And this
is what saved us. It wasn't any more or less safe than any other place
in the street, but if you're sitting at home in the basement, thinking
they are going to bomb your home, you're going crazy. It's not good.
We were practising all day, and at seven o'clock we would go home
and sit with the curtains closed, everything closed and dark the way
it had to be.'
Sponsors weren't interested in a young Serb, even when he won junior
European titles, so Djokovic's parents had to rely on their extended
family for help. Perhaps that partly explains why Djokovic is so keen
to be an ambassador for his homeland. 'He always feels he needs to
act diplomatically,' says his coach, Marian Vajda. 'He loves his country.'
And yet, ironically, his popularity has become so overpowering that
he has to train abroad. 'Even to come to see his family is hard,'
Vajda says. 'He gets so bothered. Last time we had a practice in Belgrade
we had 20 people on the court, so I said no more. It's better for
him to practise somewhere else. But of course he misses it so much.'
Belgrade Arena holds 20,000 people. Tonight, every seat is filled,
and every person present - little boy, teenage girl, adult male -
seems to have a fairly open crush on 'Nole', as they call him here.
The other participants in the celebrity doubles match, Tipsarevic,
Ivanovic and Jankovic, are announced to loud cheers. When Djokovic
appears, however, the cheers turn to hysterical screams. Grown men
hurl themselves down the stadium steps to get closer. The four greet
one another as the old friends they are; Djokovic, living up to his
heart-throb role, offers Ana an elaborate bow that ends on bended
knee. The crowd loves it.
Although they played at different clubs, Djokovic has practised and
played with Ivanovic since they were five years old. 'She's a fantastic
girl,' he has told me earlier, 'one of the nicest I've ever met. She
has such a great personality, very calm and very positive. And she's
beautiful as well! She has a beautiful smile. She's attracting people
wherever she goes because she's very bright and people recognise it
and respect her.' Has she ever taken a game off you? 'No!' Then: 'I'm
joking. Of course she has. But I could never play with her 100 per
cent serious because I laugh with her more than anyone else. I really
enjoy practising with her.' Who's better, Ana or Jelena? Djokovic
is too gentlemanly to be drawn. 'I just say... I don't know! I wouldn't,
because they're both playing great tennis.'
The exhibition match is only one set long, much of it a showcase for
his on-court silliness and, of course, impersonations. At the end
of the evening, Djokovic and Tipsarevic join the band to sing a popular,
though puzzling, song about friendship (sample lyrics: 'I myself am
a migratory bird'). Djokovic's voice is not what you would call tuneful,
but right now he could release a recording of his tooth-brushing routine
and still have a number-one hit. Maybe one day, he says, he could
be a singer, or an actor. 'Or who knows what,' he says. 'I'm really
enjoying my time.'
(Published: 10.01.2008.)
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