In recent years, the ‘battle’ has been developing more and more between tennis enthusiasts and also professionals about who is the real GOAT, a noun given to the strongest tennis player in history. In the last twenty years we have seen an incredible match between three tennis legends: Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer.
The fans of each tend to support the cause of their athlete and no one can say for sure who is the best tennis player of all time. In the last year we have had important details about this challenge: Roger Federer officially said goodbye to tennis at the age of 41 and in the same year his great rivals increased their victories: Novak Djokovic climbed to 21 titles with success at Wimbledon while Rafael Nadal he made a great start to the season and reached 22 Grand Slam titles, thanks to his successes at the Australian Open and Roland Garros.
It must be said that compared to the two rivals, Rafael Nadal has played the Australian Open and the US Open without the usual rivals with Novak Djokovic detained by the laws against those who do not have a vaccine for Covid 19.
A recent Eurosport poll found that according to tennis fans, it is Novak Djokovic, regardless of the number of Grand Slam titles, the GOAT. The well-known broadcaster conducted a survey based on 4662 interviewees, tennis fans, and for 51% of these, the real GOAT is the Serbian champion.
However, not everyone tends to take sides on the issue, just think of former tennis player John McEnroe. He said in an interview: «If I had to choose the GOAT among these three, I would tend to divide them; Roger Federer is the GOAT on grass, Djokovic is the best on hard and Rafael Nadal on clay.»
Lisnard opens up about Djokovic
Daniil Medvedev’s youth coach and former ATP player Jean-Rene Lisnard is of the opinion that Novak Djokovic’s participation in the Australian Open is irrelevant in deciding his greatness. «Djokovic is Djokovic, and he will continue to be regardless of whether or not he participates in the Australian Open.
He is Superovich!” he said. “If he doesn’t play in this or that tournament, what will become of him? Only the tournament will suffer. He fights for his rights, and I think he’s right. Before, I really didn’t like him, but the further this whole situation progressed, the more I sympathized with him.
He is the only one in this world of tennis who can call things by their name and do what he wants,» he said. «This inspires great respect.»
