Novak Djokovic once again showed his greatness, but this time not as a tennis player, but as a person.
The 37-year-old Serbian might be called the greatest of all time by many, but that refers to his on-court abilities. On top of that, those who know him well recognize why Djokovic is a great person also away from the courts, as Juan Martin del Potro recently experienced.
The tall Argentinian officially said goodbye to his tennis career with one last match in his native Argentina, and standing on the opposite side of the court was no other than Novak Djokovic.
Del Potro beat Djokovic in the exhibition match to victoriously end his tennis career, with the 24-time Grand Slam champion greatly helping that result.
It was clear that Djokovic wanted his good friend to end his career with one last win, sending the vast majority of the balls to Del Potro’s powerful forehand, with the Argentinian then able to produce some throwback moments of magic.
But it wasn’t the Serbian’s ability to let him win the match without making it very obvious that the 2009 US Open champion cherished. At the end of the day, he knew that his level was far from where it once used to be.
What really meant a lot to Del Potro was the fact that Djokovic made his way all the way to Argentina during the off-season, the time of the season when players try not to disrupt their schedule too much to ideally prepare for the new season.
For example, a couple of years ago, Casper Ruud participated in an exhibition tour with Rafael Nadal during the off-season, and he had one of the worst seasons of his career after that.