Novak Djokovic suffered his first singles defeat of the 2024 season after a 6-4 6-4 defeat to Alex De Minaur at the United Cup.
Djokovic had treatment on his arm throughout the contest as he lost in straight sets in Perth.
The victory was De Minaur’s first over Djokovic and also resulted in giving Australia the lead in the quarter-final.
It was a tight start to the match as Djokovic started in confident fashion but it was always his serve that was under the most threat during the match.
In the first set, Djokovic only won three points on return as De Minaur was impressively confident and consistent on serve as dictated play with the forehand.
The world number 12 continued to cause problems to Djokovic’s serve as he created two break points in the seventh game before the Serb held in an eight minute game to take a 4-3 lead.
However it was only a matter of time before De Minaur landed the crucial blow as Djokovic continued to struggle with his arm.
A comfortable break of serve in the ninth game all but secured the opening set which lasted 50 minutes.
As expected Djokovic responded strongly in the second set as he had a half-opportunity to break in the second game.
That opportunity came and went as De Minaur would hold in his next three service games as a break in the seventh game secured the crucial break for the Australian.
After showing service jitters from 40-0 up, De Minaur closed out the match on his fourth match point to send the Perth crowd wild.
The win means that Australia are one win away from the semi-finals at the United Cup.
As for Djokovic, he has a lot of thinking to do ahead of the Australian Open and will hope that Olga Danilovic can extend his stay at the United Cup.
Poland Reach Semi-Finals
The winner of Australia and Serbia will join Poland in the semi-finals after they defeated China 2-0.
Hubert Hurkacz and Iga Swaitek defeated Zhizhen Zhang and Qinwen Zheng respectively to secure a place in the final four.
Speaking after her win Swiatek is pleased that Poland’s United Cup run continues, “I’m really happy with my game, and also how the atmosphere in the team is,” Swiatek told the WTA website.
“I really feel like we can just be better when we’re together, so for sure playing [with Hurkacz] is an exciting thing to do, and I’m real happy with every match that I play here.”
Poland will now play France or Norway in Sydney in the semi-finals over the weekend.
