A year after his semifinals against Alexander Zverev, the Serbian tennis star Novak Djokovic is reaching for the sixth title and a record bonus at the ATP Finals.
In the semifinals, the 35-year-old prevailed in Turin despite problems 7: 6 (7: 5), 7: 6 (8: 6) against the American Taylor Fritz and reached the final of the ATP Finals for the eighth time. There he will meet the Norwegian world number four Casper Ruud or the Russian Andrei Rubljov on Sunday, who will play against each other in the second semi-final on Saturday evening.
Tournament victory brings record bonus
With his sixth triumph at the end of the season, Djokovic can draw level with the record holder Roger Federer from Switzerland, who has since retired. Since he was also undefeated in the preliminary round of this year’s tournament, if he were successful he would receive the ATP Tour record bounty of $4.74 million. In the semi-finals, the Serb didn’t seem untouchable, but in the end he won the decisive points.
Although the 21-time Grand Slam tournament winner initially took a 3-2 lead with a break, he did not play his best tennis and only won the first set in the tie-break. In the second round, the tournament favorite fell behind and only managed the break at 5:5 when Fritz served to equalize the set. Fritz slipped into the field as a replacement for the injured Spanish world number one Carlos Alcaraz. Last year, Zverev celebrated tournament victory at the ATP Finals, this time the Hamburger is missing due to his long injury break.
