He can savor.
Even if he did not have a particular demonstration, the relief is palpable in the eyes.
At the end of a long and terrible battle of 3:10 of play, the world number 1 dominated in 4 sets (4-6, 6-2, 6-3, 6-4) the Spaniard Pablo Carreno Busta (n ° 18 ).
This success allows him to win, in pain, his ticket for his 10th semi-final at Roland Garros.
This is the first time since the start of the tournament that the Serbian has been so pushed to its limits.
For a while, it was indeed believed that the 29-year-old Spaniard had become Djokovic's pet peeve this year.
A little over a month ago, the two men met in the round of 16 of the US Open.
A meeting that remains a painful memory for the Serbian.
He was disqualified after inadvertently throwing a ball at a linesman in a moody gesture.
Strictly speaking, not a defeat but his only game lost in 2020 (for now 30 wins and 4 gleaned tournaments).
Novak Djokovic wins in four sets 🚨🚨
It's over!
A final winning shot and the Serbian won against Pablo Carreno Busta 💪
A fight of 3:13 and a victory 4-6, 6-2, 6-3, 6-4 for the world No. 1, who joined Stefanos Tsitsipas in the last square # RG20 pic.twitter.com/A3B5Tag7Vs
- France tv sport (@francetvsport) October 7, 2020
From the start of the match, spectators do not recognize the player who has tortured all his opponents since the start of the tournament.
Djokovic was one of the few - along with Rafael Nadal and Diego Schwartzman - to reach the quarterfinals without losing a single set.
But at the start of the game, he is only a shadow of himself and multiplies unforced errors (16 against 9 for his opponent).
The loss of the first set (4-6) will however serve as an electric shock.
After calling on the physiotherapist to treat his left arm and neck, the world number 1 regains his punching power and surgical precision.
His balls clean the white lines from the baseline.
Intensity rises over the points.
The two men surrender blow for blow but in the end it is indeed “Nole” who carries the final blow.
As often this year.
“We had to be patient because Pablo is a good player who doesn't make a lot of mistakes,” says the winner of the evening.
At the beginning I was not well but I found the rhythm and the patience.
This is not the first time that the Serb has reversed a situation that seemed compromised, that we think he is on the verge of abandonment before he sounds the revolt.
At the start of the year, in the Australian Open final, he was led 2 sets to 1 and called on the physiotherapist before winning in 5 rounds over Dominic Thiem.
At 33, Djokovic is still in the race to clinch his 18th Grand Slam title - which would bring him closer to his best "enemies" Rafael Nadal (19) and Roger Federer (20) - and allow him to become the first player in the world. Open era to win at least twice each of the four Majors.
In the semi-final, this Friday, he will face the Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas (n ° 5) who qualified by beating the Russian Andrey Rublev (12th) earlier in the day in three sets (7-5, 6- 2, 6-3).
At 22, he became the first Greek to climb into the last four of the Paris tournament.
