SHANGHAI—Novak Djokovic won a record fourth Shanghai Masters title with a 6-3, 6-4 win over 13th-seeded Borna Coric on Sunday.
The second-seeded Djokovic has won all four Shanghai finals he’s contested in his career (2012, 2013, 2015 and 2018). He previously shared the record of winning three Shanghai titles with Andy Murray.
Djokovic holds an 11-0 overall record in finals played in China, where he also won the Beijing tournament six times and the 2008 year-end Tennis Masters Cup held in Shanghai.
“Maybe I was Chinese in the past life,” said Djokovic, smiling, in explaining impressive record in the country. “I wouldn’t be surprised, to be honest, with the way I feel here and the way I communicate and have relationship with the people.
“It’s all very, very positive, for more than10 years that I have been coming to China. There is something special about this place that makes me feel like at home.”
Djokovic dominated opponents behind his powerful serve, winning all 47 of his service games during the tournament.
“Well, to be honest, I’m not sure whether it has happened ever, you know, that I go through a tournament without dropping one service game,” Djokovic said. “I’m sure that it hasn’t happened too many times if it did. So this was definitely one of the best service weeks that I had in my career.
“But for me serve was always, so to say, a hidden weapon, the shot in the game that is obviously very important, ‘the’ most important. But I always try to use it with an accuracy and efficiency rather than speed and power.”
The Serb offered 13th-seeded Coric one break point in the match, in the sixth game of the second set. Coric, who has yet to win a set against Djokovic in three matches played, sailed a forehand wide to miss out on the rare opportunity.
“It was really tough,” Coric said. “I didn’t know what to do exactly. I thought I was playing actually really well, which is in that moment not good because if I play bad, okay, I know I need to start playing better, need to change something.
“I’m just happy with the whole week. I think it was a really good week for me.”
Djokovic, who has now won four titles this season, will move up one ranking spot to No. 2, pushing Roger Federer back to No. 3.
The victory extended his winning streak to 18 matches, the longest of the season by any male player. Federer and Nadal both had 17-match winning streaks during the year.
Coric, who had his right thigh wrapped throughout the match, saved three match points on his own serve in the ninth game of the second set.
But the Croatian couldn’t prevent Djokovic from snatching the title on a fourth match point in the next game. Djokovic won the final game to love when Coric sailed a backhand long.
Juan Martin del Potro, meanwhile, has fractured his right patella bone in what the Argentine called “a hard blow that leaves me without strength.”
Del Potro retired on Thursday against Borna Coric at the Shanghai Masters after injuring his knee. Third-seeded del Potro fell near the end of the first set. The US Open finalist had the knee wrapped but called it quits after losing the first set, 7-5.
Tests on Saturday showed the fracture, Del Potro’s spokesman Jorge Viale tweeted on Sunday.
“In the coming days, the doctors will evaluate the recovery process needed to return,” Viale said.
In Tianjin, China, second-seeded Caroline Garcia won her first tournament of the year with a 7-6 (7), 6-3 win over top-seeded Karolina Pliskova in the Tianjin Open on Sunday.
It was the 16th-ranked Garcia’s first title since she won back-to-back trophies at the Wuhan and Beijing tournaments in Asia just over a year ago.
The Frenchwoman’s two titles at the end of last season earned her a spot into the year-end Women’s Tennis Association (WTA) Finals in Singapore. This year, the victory in Tianjin is not enough to put Garcia into a second consecutive final appearance.
Pliskova’s failure to take the title also kept her from confirming a berth in the WTA Finals.
Currently in eighth place in the race to Singapore, the Czech will have to wait out the results from next week’s tournaments in Luxembourg and Moscow to see if she qualifies for one of the two remaining spots. Pliskova is scheduled to play in Moscow.
Ukrainian Elena Svitolina and Dutchwoman Kiki Bertens are the other remaining contenders for Singapore after American Sloane Stephens was confirmed as the sixth player to qualify on Sunday. She joins Simona Halep, Angelique Kerber, Naomi Osaka, Petra Kvitova and Caroline Wozniacki as players who have secured places for Singapore.
Garcia was down, 1-5, in the first set tiebreaker before she rebounded. She saved a set point for Pliskova at 5-6 to go on to win the hourlong first set.
In the second set, Garcia raced to a 5-0 lead, and first served for the match at 5-1, but had to wait for her victory to come three games later. She secured the title with her sixth ace of the match.
Image credits: AP