Jannik Sinner U-turn called \u2018one of the most astonishing PR moves in tennis history\u2019<\/a><\/p>\nWhile questioning the 38-year-old\u2019s long-term future in the sport, Flink insisted that it was a \u201cfalse argument\u201d to claim that Djokovic should be competing against Court\u2019s 52-year-old milestone.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think Novak can accept these three semi-finals \u2013 he\u2019s a little disappointed but still proud of that,\u201d said Flink.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf he gets to New York and suffers a surprise loss in the fourth round, I think he might seriously wonder if it\u2019s all worth it. \u2018How will things improve next year? I\u2019ll be 39; why would my body respond better?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I don\u2019t understand is his pursuit of a 25th Grand Slam. It makes sense in terms of surpassing Margaret Court.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it\u2019s a false argument, a false target. Mainly from the media, because they constantly place his photo next to Margaret\u2019s.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s not in competition with Margaret Court because she isn\u2019t even in the conversation for the greatest female player of all time. She\u2019s far from it.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery expert would rank [Martina] Navratilova, [Steffi] Graf, Serena Williams, and [Chris] Evert above Margaret.\u201d<\/p>\n
Court is one of just 10 women in history to complete the Career Grand Slam and claimed the Calendar Grand Slam in 1970, a feat only Steffi Graf has repeated since.<\/p>\n
However, the Australian won 13 of her 24 Grand Slam singles titles before the Open Era, the point usually considered the cutoff for modern tennis records.<\/p>\n
Court also won 11 of her 24 titles at the Australian Championships, later the Australian Open, at a time when the majority of the world\u2019s top players skipped the event due to travel concerns.<\/p>\n
While undeniably a great of the game, Flink \u2013 a Hall of Fame inductee \u2013 believes it is incorrect to compare Djokovic\u2019s career to the Australian\u2019s.<\/p>\n
Flink added: \u201cShe [Court] won many Australian Opens without real competition.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t mean to disparage her, but many of those draws were very weak because, often in those years, Billie Jean King or Maria Bueno didn\u2019t even play.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe could breeze through the draw in ways she never could at Roland Garros, Wimbledon, or the US Open.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf Novak took a step back to think, he\u2019d realise that the record he always chased was surpassing Rafa and Roger to become the men\u2019s leader.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen suddenly, the discussion shifted: he passed them, but could he pass Margaret Court? The 100th title was worth it \u2013 it was a relief to get that done. But he doesn\u2019t need this 25th Grand Slam.\u201d<\/p>\n
Read Next:\u00a0The 7 men with the best win rate in ATP Tour finals: Novak Djokovic on 69.7%, Rafael Nadal 6th<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Novak Djokovic\u2019s search for a 25th Grand Slam singles title has been described as a \u201cfalse target\u201d \u2013…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22473,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-22472","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-tennis","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22472"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22472\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22473"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}