Despite winning all the titles a tennis player can dream of and breaking numerous records, Novak Djokovic still loves to compete at the highest level and it is precisely this motivation that allowed him to win today's battle against Yannick Hanfmann at the Shanghai Masters 1000.
The German ace put in one of the best performances of his career and an underwhelming version of Nole exhausted due to the brutal weather conditions allowed him to come very close to a memorable feat.
The world number 150 had to surrender in three sets, but forced the 38-year-old Serbian to stay on the court for almost three hours and raise his level to avoid a premature elimination. The veteran from Belgrade a finalist in this tournament in the last edition fought on every point despite not playing his best tennis and qualified for the round of 16, where he will face Spanish star Jaume Munar on Tuesday.
Djokovic advances in Shanghai
The former world No.1 who currently occupies third place in the ATP Race despite having played few tournaments even in 2025 has won 21 of the last 24 matches played on the professional tour and has only been defeated by Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz in this time.
"The conditions are the same for everyone, but playing in this humidity is really brutal" confessed Novak during his press conference. "I had to deal with a very complicated situation today and Yannick played very well from the start. I couldn't have done more and I'm proud to have been able to play for three hours in front of these wonderful fans at 38 years old," he added.
The serve was certainly one of the keys to Djokovic's win: "He came very close to beating me, he was better than me for a set and a half, then I started to read his serve better and I came back. As for my performance, the serve is definitely the shot that worked the most in the first two rounds of this tournament. Although the courts and balls are slower than last year, it is not easy to make breaks. At the same time, I have to improve my game from baseline."
