Novak Djokovic showed off the team spirit he possesses as he decided to hang out with his fellow Serbian athletes in the Olympic Village on his day off. Despite opting to stay outside the village and in his own accommodation in Paris, the 24-time Grand Slam champion decided to make good use of his day off and hang out with a number of his compatriots on Tuesday.
Their time spent was commemorated in the form of social media posts with the tennis icon posing for snaps with the likes of boxer Sara Cirkovic who simply called the 37-year-old “role model” while judoka Strahinja Buncic branded him the “one and only” on Instagram.
Djokovic made headlines for his decision to stay outside the village in what is his fifth Olympic Games in a bid to ensure privacy and focus as he aims to add an Olympic title to his enormous list of honours with a medal remaining the last piece of silverware missing from his trophy cabinet.
Djokovic – who is likely staying with his family who’ve been spotted cheering him on in his matches – surely got several congratulatory messages from his compatriots as just a day before his visit to the village, he dismantled Rafael Nadal 6-1 6-4 to move into the third round of the men’s singles in Paris.
In what was a dominating performance from Djokovic, who inflicted just a fifth defeat in 118 singles matches for the Spaniard at Roland Garros, the Serbian was particularly critical of his performance in the second set where his uncharacteristic errors saw Nadal pile on a potential comeback but the clay court savant left too much to be done and ultimately succumbed.
“I’m very relieved,” Djokovic said. “Everything was going my way, I was 6-1, 4-0 up but I played a sloppy service game and gave him chances.” It was the 60th meeting of their legendary rivalry that has spun 18 years with Djokovic narrowly leading their head to head 31-29 as he added: “I never thought back in 2006 that we’d still be playing each other almost 20 years later”.
A quarter-final match-up against Stefanos Tsitsipas awaits the Serbian on Thursday (August 1) where a win for Djokovic will see him take on the winner of Alexander Zverev vs Lorenzo Mussetti, with the former the current men’s Olympic champion, having won gold in Tokyo.
