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The win in China was Novak Djokovic\u2019s 102nd of his career [Tingshu Wang\/Reuters]Alcaraz retains Japan Open crown<\/p>\nNovac Djokovic won 102nd match of his career, while ATP 500 tournament victory was Carlos Alcaraz\u2019s third of the year.<\/p>\n
Published On 6 Oct 20266 Oct 2026<\/p>\n
Novak Djokovic won the China Open after his opponent Alex de Minaur retired from the final with injury, while Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz retained his Japan Open crown to continue his resurgence after a lengthy wrist injury layoff.<\/p>\n
The 39-year-old Serbian won the first set in the tie-break 7-6 (7-3) and was down a game in the second set when the Australian ended the match with retirement on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
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Djokovic extended an astonishing unbeaten streak in Beijing and winning the 102nd title of his career.<\/p>\n
De Minaur left the court for a medical timeout after losing the first-set tie break but played on with his left thigh heavily bandaged. However, he had to stop after winning the first game of the second set, leaving him trailing 7-6(3) 0-1.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t feel great \u2026 I want to say sorry to all the amazing fans,\u201d de Minaur said at the trophy presentation.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t want to finish like this \u2026 hopefully see you next year,\u201d added the 27-year-old fifth seed.<\/p>\n
The win in China was Novak Djokovic\u2019s 102nd of his career [Tingshu Wang\/Reuters]Alcaraz retains Japan Open crown<\/p>\n
Alcaraz made another slow start before cruising past unseeded Czech Jiri Lehecka 7-6(4) 6-4 in the Japan Open final on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
The ATP 500 tournament victory is Alcaraz\u2019s third of the year after the Australian Open and Qatar Open, before the 23-year-old was sidelined by an injury for nearly five months and returned at the US Open in late August.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really happy to be able to lift a trophy again,\u201d Alcaraz said. \u201cIt\u2019s been a while and obviously it\u2019s extra special after my injury and my comeback, in the second tournament that I\u2019m playing.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a really tough week and I didn\u2019t play my best tennis and my best level but I did find good solutions and that\u2019s what matters in the end.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alcaraz became the first man to go back-to-back in Tokyo since American Pete Sampras won the men\u2019s title in both 1993 and 1994.<\/p>\n
The world number three started shakily, dropping serve in the first game, but soon recovered and dialled up the intensity to break world number 19 Lehecka\u2019s serve with a scorching backhand to level at 3-3.<\/p>\n
More uncharacteristic errors from Alcaraz gave Lehecka hope in the tiebreak, but the Spaniard unleashed a sublime drop-shot en route to clinching the opening set to lay the platform for his 27th title overall.<\/p>\n
Alcaraz says he \u2018trusted\u2019 himself<\/p>\n
The seven-time Grand Slam champion took control midway through the second set, breaking to claim a 4-3 lead before sealing victory by forcing an error on match point and then celebrating wildly with his team courtside.<\/p>\n
Alcaraz said his triumph helped erase the doubts that he faced during his injury break.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of negative thoughts come to your mind,\u201d Alcaraz added: \u201cIf you\u2019re going to come back healthy, if you\u2019re going to come back the same as you were before, if I will be able to hit the ball normally without pain. I trusted myself and it worked out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alcaraz will return to action at the Shanghai Masters where he will take on Argentina\u2019s Juan Manuel Cerundolo or a qualifier first. The main draw of the ATP 1000 event begins on Wednesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Novac Djokovic won 102nd match of his career, while ATP 500 tournament victory was Carlos Alcaraz\u2019s third of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":918646,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[77,64,63,512,941,588,85,747],"class_list":["post-918645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-asia-pacific","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-china","tag-japan","tag-sport","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=918645"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/918645\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/918646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=918645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=918645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=918645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}