Novak Djokovic accuses Centre Court crowd of DISRESPECTING him during his straight-sets win over Holger Rune… despite BBC informing him they were only backing his opponent!
- Novak Djokovic was furious after his three-set victory over Holger Rune
- He felt like the crowd on Centre Court was booing him the entire match
- He was told that they only supported his opponent, but he did not accept this.
Novak Djokovic had promised ‘fireworks’ in his fourth-round match against Holger Rune and when the match itself failed to produce a single sparkler, he grabbed the microphone and pointed a Roman candle directly at the crowd on Centre Court.
The seven-time champion turned his on-court interview into a tirade about what he felt were boos directed at him. It seemed like the crowd was simply cheering Ruuuuuune on for his opponent, but Djokovic, as he often does, saw things differently.
“To all the fans who have been respectful and stayed here tonight, I think you do that from the bottom of my heart and I appreciate it,” he began. “And to all those people who have chosen to disrespect the player – in this case me – have a goooooooood night.”
His rather bemused BBC interviewer Rishi Persad said: ‘I hope they were just commenting on Rune and not disrespecting you.’
Djokovic wasn’t having it. ‘They were. They (showed no respect for me),’ he insisted. ‘I don’t accept it. No, no, no. I know they were cheering for Rune, but that’s an excuse to boo too.
Novak Djokovic took on the crowd on Centre Court on Monday, accusing them of disrespecting him
His outburst came after he defeated Holger Rune in three sets to reach the quarter-finals
“Listen, I’ve been on tour for over 20 years. I know all the tricks. I focus on the respectful people who pay the ticket, and love tennis and appreciate the players. I’ve played in much more hostile environments, believe me – you can’t touch me.”
The 37-year-old seemed to believe that some in the crowd were masquerading as boos to support Rune. To my ears, it sounded no different than Lord saluting Joe Root after a century.
The tennis felt almost secondary after all that fuss, but for the sake of completeness Djokovic won 6-3, 6-4, 6-2 and produced by far his best performance of the Championships so far. Rune was weak, losing the first 12 points of the match and never really recovered.
Fortunately, Djokovic won’t be facing a player with a monosyllabic surname containing the letter u or double o in Wednesday’s quarterfinals. It will be easy to distinguish the boos for him from the support for Taylor Fritz.
Djokovic was irritated by the Wimbledon crowd throughout the match and did not accept a BBC interviewer’s explanation that they had merely supported his opponent.
The American came back from two sets down to beat fourth-seeded Alexander Zverev 4-6, 6-7, 6-4, 7-6, 6-3. The match itself was not without drama.
Zverev had a long talk with Fritz at the end of the match and said afterwards that he thought some of the players in the American box were “a bit over the top.”
During the match, Fritz’s influencer girlfriend Morgan Riddle wrote “cheer loud ladies” on social media, then posted a video with the caption “when ur man wins 4 the girls.” Some saw the posts as a reference to Zverev’s lawsuit for assaulting his ex-girlfriend, which was settled last month.