Novak Djokovic, the last man standing of the "big three" in tennis after Federer and Nadal retired, is still one of the best tennis players in the world. In fact, it could be argued that, behind Alcaraz and Sinner, nobody has been better than him. While ranked fifth in the world behind Alexander Zverev and Taylor Fritz, if we look at the ATP "Race to Turin" ranking, which counts the points earned in the calendar year (2025), Djokovic is third (4,580) ahead of Zverev (4,280), only behind Sinner (8,500) and Alcaraz (11,040).
Djokovic has only won one title this year, Geneva Open, worth 250 points (also his 100th ATP title), but reached semi-finals of all four Grand Slams this year, which grants him 800 points each. His dominance may be fading away, and we've already seen how he struggled physically against younger players, as well as missing many tournaments in the calendar to focus only on Grand Slams, but Djokovic is still a force to be reckoned with as only Alcaraz or Sinner were able to stop him in majors, and intends to stay in the sport as long as possible.
"Longevity is one of my biggest motivations. I really want to see how far I can go", the 38-year-old Serbian said in Saudi Arabia. "If you see across all the global sports, LeBron James, he's still going strong, he's 40, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Tom Brady played till he was 40-something years old. I mean, it's unbelievable. They're inspiring me as well. So I want to keep going and that's one of the motivations I have."
Novak Djokovic plays against Taylor Fritz this afternoon
On Thursday, Djokovic was quickly dispatched by Sinner. The veteran Serbian player hasn't been able to defeat Sinner since the 2023 ATP Finals: since then, Sinner has won five times in a row. Djokovic said laughing "it's never nice when somebody kicks your ass like that on the court" when Sinner defeated him in the exhibition tournament Six Kings Slam.
On Saturday, Djokovic has another shot as he plays against Taylor Fritz for the third place this afternoon at 18:30 CET, 17:30 BST. In the head-to-head, Djokovic has won all eleven of their duels most recently at US Open quarter-finals this year... You can watch it live on Netflix.