Novak Djokovic played his first official match of the 2024 ATP season, and it was a good one at the United Cup, giving Serbia the lead.
Djokovic will feature prominently at the 2024 United Cup for Serbia because the country will need him if they want to achieve anything. This first matchup against China already shows that as Djokovic winning his match was crucial for his country to have a chance. Even so, he’ll play the doubles later today.
It will be a busy week for him. That’s fine because he only played one prep match so far. It was an exhibition against Carlos Alcaraz in Riyadh, a match he lost. This one was much better for the Serbian as he easily cruised by his opponent.
Zhizhen Zhang is a great player, but so much of what he does well depends on his serve. If he doesn’t have his serve firing on all cylinders, then he’s pretty limited in regards to what he can do. Djokovic took a few games to analyse his play, and once he did, it was game over.
Zhang couldn’t do much in the rallies because he lacked the consistency. It was pretty evident on the second serve once you removed his power, as Djokovic won most of those points. 6-3 was the score in the first set as Djokovic lost only a handful of points on his serve and faced no break points.
Things were even more impressive in the second set as Zhang flamed out completely in the second set. The problem was the same, he couldn’t win a point on the second serve. Djokovic couldn’t lose a point on his serve and that was that.
The final score was 6-3 6-2, as Serbia led China 1-0. The WTA match is coming up next, with many expecting China to win that one and then Djokovic to play hero in the doubles.
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