It’s an Australian Open ritual, the way lambs to the slaughter is a ritual.
An Australian pretender braves his way into the second week, then runs into the brick wall of one of the true contenders. It’s like going up a division. This is the Premier League, the heavyweight section.
It’s been this way all but twice for more than 20 years. The exceptions who got further in prove the rule. They were Lleyton Hewitt and Nick Kyrgios. One won majors, one should.
Novak Djokovic waves to the crowd after breezing past local hope Alex de Minaur.Credit:Getty Images
So it was again this sobering night on Rod Laver Arena.
The tenderised one, this time, was Alex de Minaur. Novak Djokovic didn’t just beat the man they call “Demon”. He exorcised him.
De Minaur was favourite in two of the three senses of the word. He was the crowd’s pet, with not a hint of divisiveness about him. He was the underdog, a particularly Australian form of favourite. But whichever way you held it up to the light, he was not the likely winner. Every stat was against him, and every instinct, too.
Nonetheless, we’d convinced ourselves that he could upset Novak Djokovic. It’s part of the ritual. He’d convinced himself. His strength was his leg speed around the court. He would make Djokovic play more balls, would put that wonky hamstring of his to the stress test. He would run Djokovic off his legs.
Also, at 23, he was bigger and stronger, with a serve not to be sneezed at. He’d beaten Daniil Medvedev late last year, Rafael Nadal early this. He was killing them in hit-ups.
But he’d never played Djokovic. The Serb’s seen them in and seen them out. He wasn’t the crowd favourite, but he rarely is. He’s used to weight of numbers against. He gives the impression that he’d like to be better liked. But you suspect he’s happy enough to be held in permanent awe. A rump in the crowd gave him a bit of minor grief. De Minaur wished he could.
Besides, it’s problematic who was most at home here. De Minaur plays on RLA now and then. Djokovic has won nine titles there. The only two times he’s played an Australian out there, he’s won, beating Hewitt twice. He goes around the world meeting and beating local heroes. He’s only ever lost to one in a major, Murray at Wimbledon in 2013.
Djokovic hasn’t lost at the Australian Open since 2018. He hasn’t lost anywhere in Australia since then. He didn’t again.
Wally Masur suggested de Minaur’s first objective should be to stretch the first set to an hour, whatever the outcome. After an hour, Djokovic led 6-2 4-0. The lady comfortable in her own skin was already beginning to sing. In two hours and spare change, they were done.
Coach and commentator Mark Petchey said de Minaur should play down the centre of the court, so as not to give Djokovic angles with which to work. But Djokovic found the angles anyway. He was the one making de Minaur scramble all over the court. De Minaur was the poacher poached, moreover fried.
To be honest, Djokovic looked like he was pacing himself, as a man with a dicky hamstring might. But it might simply have been that this was a match-up he could and did take in his stride. Still, he could have had the decency to work up a little hamstring scare, a grab, a limp, something for the cameras, something for the press. Nup.
“Tonight, it wasn’t obvious I was dealing with an injury,” he said. “I didn’t feel anything today. Today was great.”
De Minaur thanked him for nothing.
Alex de Minaur leaves Rod Laver Arena for the final time in the 2023 Australian Open.Credit:Getty Images
Djokovic’s hamstring evidently is like his game – indestructible. If Djokovic’s future opponents in this tournament were watching, it would have been from behind their couches. De Minaur did not have the luxury of such cover.
We do put great expectations on our neophytes. Tacitly, we project that to be Australian is a kind of superpower. It’s not.
De Minaur did nothing conspicuously or egregiously wrong. He did do his best. But he’s not really Hewitt, other than in heart, and he’ll never be Kyrgios, and for that we can be at least partly thankful. He’d not played Djokovic before; he won’t want to again anytime soon.
Much as de Minaur must have looked forward to getting onto RLA this night, he would have been even keener to get off it. A man has dignity. Sport can be cruel in the way it sometimes hangs its devotees out to dry.
Djokovic was, in a word, sublime. This was the way Roger Federer used to euthanise local heroes, quickly as to minimise the pain. To be fair to de Minaur, Djokovic has done the same thing here to Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray, in finals.
The ritual always ends the same way. The champ says something suitably humble about how much he admires the fall guy, apologises to the crowd and says he still loves them and hopes they will be on his side in the next round.
But Djokovic does not do faux humble.
“I cannot say I’m sorry that you haven’t watched a longer match,” he said. “I really wanted to win in straight sets. (And) I played my best match of the year so far.”
