Djokovic struggled physically in the final set and took a controversial time-out before Wawrinka’s serve, but the Swiss held firm in Arthur Ashe Stadium to seal a dramatic victory. Fans and Wawrinka became frustrated at certain points with the delays in an already grueling match.
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The unassuming Swiss has won all three major finals in which he has appeared – the 2014 Australian Open, the 2015 French Open and now the 2016 US Open, secured with a four-set win over Djokovic on Sunday.
Wawrinka, who won his first major at the 2014 Australian Open, may be the ultimate big-game player in men’s tennis.
“I never had a goal to win a Grand Slam but I am trying as best I can. You can see after the match, when I don’t do anything, because I am completely empty and dead and all the emotions coming”.
The Pole has now won all three of his grand slam finals, and goes equal with Britain’s Andy Murray with his three titles.
Wawrinka, who had handed Djokovic two of his biggest Grand Slam disappointments, including in the French Open final past year, said he expected his marathon tournament to be capped by an endurance test against the Serb. The Serb advanced to the second round with a walkover and won both his third round and the quarterfinal when his opponents were forced to retire with injuries.
“He likes to occasionally whack the ball quite hard, and I don’t think that Novak likes that”, said Wawrinka’s coach, Magnus Norman.
“I don’t know what’s happening right now”, he said, clearly exhausted after a slog of a match that lasted just under four hours.
The final score was 7-6, 6-4, 7-5, 6-3.
The two mega-stars within the sport of tennis did battle against one another for nearly four hours, before Wawrinka was finally able to see out the match, beating Djokovic by a scoreline of 6-7 6-4 7-5 6-3.
On his second match point, the No. 3-seeded Wawrinka captured the title when an ailing Djokovic sailed a backhand long. The play went for about 4hrs. However, Wawrinka was able to break the Serb again late in play.
Trailing 3-1 in the fourth set, Djokovic was granted the unusual chance to have a medical timeout at a time other than a changeover.
And so that’s all she wrote at the 2016 US Open, and that’s all at the grand slams for another year in which Novak Djokovic and Angelique Kerber dominated, winning two grand slams each, and each finishing runner-up at another.
“At this level of professional sport in tennis, after playing seven, eight months of the season you are not fresh”. “I’m not good enough to start and say, ‘OK, I’m going to win a Grand Slam this year.’ No”.
Djokovic said that he lost his nerve in the “important moments”. “He kept his cool”, said the 2011 and 2015 champion. I was only focused on the match, not what can happen if I win the match. “But I have them and I’m happy to take the trophy back home”. It was a bad conversion of the break points. Djokovic said he was allowed to take it, so he did. “My goal is to give everything I have to be the best I can”.
“But I was convinced that my game was there”.
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“I spend so much time on the court”.
