Rennae Stubbs suggests Father Time is catching as much as Novak Djokovic and wonders how a lot time the Serb has left within the sport amid his ongoing well being struggles.
Though Carlos Alcaraz did not play and Jannik Sinner misplaced early, Djokovic nonetheless didn’t win his first Masters title in two years in Shanghai. Whereas the previous world No. 1 made the semifinal and got here two wins away from lifting the primary glory, his bid was minimize brief within the semifinal following a shock 3-6 4-6 loss to qualifier Valentin Vacherot. In the course of the match, the 38-year-old evidently struggled and needed to obtain medical therapy.
Nevertheless, even earlier than the Vacherot loss, the present world No. 5 struggled bodily in a few of his Shanghai matches. And it wasn’t just one difficulty because the Serb handled an sickness, in addition to leg, hip and again points.
Sadly for Djokovic, it wasn’t something new for him in 2025 – he retired from his Australian Open semifinal match resulting from a hamstring harm, battled a swollen eye on the Miami Masters, and handled a leg harm throughout a Wimbledon semifinal loss to Sinner.
Stubbs: The identical factor retains occurring to Djokovic within the later components of tournaments… How lengthy he’ll proceed like this?
“He is simply breaking down on a regular basis. If there was a legit harm, which I am assuming it was within the first set, he appeared fairly good within the second set. However the identical factor retains occurring within the latter components of tournaments for him, proper? Novak simply would not appear like he has sufficient on the ball anymore in opposition to a few of these gamers… In some unspecified time in the future, and I’ve spoken about it for months, really possibly even a 12 months or two, Father Time catches up with you. In some unspecified time in the future, it catches up with you, and, you simply surprise, how lengthy is he going to do that for?” Stubbs, who gained six Grand Slam titles throughout girls’s and combined doubles throughout her profession, mentioned on her podcast.
In the meantime, at this week’s Six Kings Slam in Riyadh, Djokovic confirmed that he has no intention to retire quickly.
