“I’ve played a lot of tennis from the beginning of preparation through the finals of the Australian Open, more or less every day”, Djokovic said Sunday.
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Djokovic only reached the milestone of 600 wins in November 2014 and has taken just 479 days to rack up another century after losing just six matches since then to join Roger Federer (1,067) and Rafael Nadal (775) as the only active players to reach the 700 mark.
His opponent Jaziri beat Mikhail Youzhny 6-4, 6-1 to progress into the second round but with a world ranking of 121, he is not expected to challenge the Serbian. You know, very few things went wrong. It’s been three weeks since I’ve played a match.
Anything other than victory in Dubai, where Djokovic will potentially only face two other top-10 players, would be a huge shock especially after Federer withdrew with injury.
“I’m not pleased to hear what happened to him”.
“I played some of my best tennis at the Open past year against Novak in the night session”. The 25 year old goes on to face Marcos Baghdatis, who defeated Viktor Troicki 7-6(2), 6-2 in 90 minutes.
Already he has two titles this year-a career 60th in Doha and a record-tying sixth Australian Open-to take his tally to 13 titles from 17 consecutive finals. I put a lot of dedication in to get the results that I’ve had.
The world number one will begin at the Aviation Club in the first round against Spain’s Tommy Robredo, and the 28-year-old Serb’s mental and physical level could not be at a much higher pitch.
Swiss Wawrinka agreed, saying that the atmosphere in Dubai is unique “and I understand that so many of my colleagues also do their winter training here because of the warm weather and good conditions”.
The second seed, Stan Wawrinka, overwhelmed Franko Skugor 7-5, 6-1 to set up a quarter-final meeting with Philipp Kohlschreiber, a 6-2, 7-6 (7-5) victor over Borna Coric. In tennis you never know.
Djokovic is playing in his first tournament since winning the 2016 Australian Open.
Fourth-seeded Roberto Bautista Agut of Spain pummeled Hyeon Chung of South Korea 6-0, 6-1 to reach his fifth quarterfinal of the year.
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Vasek Pospisil also moved into the second round with a 6-3 5-7 6-4 over French qualifier Lucas Pouille.
