Novak Djokovic wins the 2022 Wimbledon title after defeating Nick Kyrgios in four sets in absorbing final on Sunday.
At 35 years and 49 days, Djokovic is the second oldest man in the Open era to win Wimbledon. Federer was almost 36 years old when he took the title in 2017. This was Djokovic’s 32nd Grand Slam singles final, a record for the men’s game but not the women. Chris Evert played in 34 Grand Slam finals while Serena Williams has made 33 appearances at this stage of a Slam.
With today’s win, Djokovic has won his last 28 matches at the All England Club. It is nine years since Djokovic last lost a match on Centre Court, with that defeat coming against Andy Murray in the 2013 final (although he lost in 2016 and 2017, those matches were played on No.1 Court).
Playing in the broiling heat of the All England Club, with temperatures exceeding 35 degrees Celsius, and with his opponent regularly talking to himself and his player’s box between points, this could potentially have become a hot, fractious and chaotic afternoon for Djokovic.
Instead he put himself level with his boyhood idol Pete Sampras on seven Wimbledon titles. Now only Roger Federer, with eight, has won more.
Crouching and snacking on a few blades of the Centre Court grass – because that’s how he likes to celebrate his Wimbledon wins – Djokovic would also have been reflecting on how his victory brought him a 21st Grand Slam title, taking him to within one of Rafael Nadal‘s portfolio of 22.
Djokovic’s earliest memory of watching tennis on television, and the match that inspired him to ask his parents for a racket, was seeing Sampras lift this trophy for the first time in 1993.
The American would go on to win six more titles, and now Djokovic has just as many.
“I’ve lost words for what this tournament and what this trophy means to me. It always has been the most special tournament. It was the one that motivated me to play tennis. Every time this tournament gets more special and meaningful,” said Djokovic.
What a way to celebrate his wedding anniversary with his wife Jelena, and to move on from the emotional turbulence of being deported from Melbourne before January’s Australian Open and from the disappointment of losing to Nadal in the quarter-finals of Roland-Garros.
Astonishingly, Andy Murray remains the last man to beat Djokovic on Centre Court, in the 2013 final. “He’s a bit of a God,” Kyrgios said.
For the first time, the sport’s most volatile character found himself in the white heat of a Grand Slam final, a scenario that he and almost everyone else in the sport had thought they would never see.
This felt like an exhilarating but potentially unwise experiment, a bit like dropping a large chunk of sodium in a champagne flute, standing back and watching it fizz.
For all his suggestions that he and Djokovic have been having “a bromance”, there was never any expectation among the Centre Court crowd that the final would be played in an atmosphere as calm and tranquil as a yoga retreat.
Djokovic had been predicting “emotional fireworks” and he wasn’t wrong.
