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You can see Their 58th duel was another gladiatorial clash for the ages, so astoundingly good that the Paris crowd was even granted special dispensation to stay on after the city-wide curfew to watch the denouement.
There'd have been a riot if they'd been kicked out after an amazing third set which in itself lasted an hour-and-a-half and hadn't been able to witness what felt like the end of an era as the 35-year-old Nadal was beaten at Roland Garros for only the third time in 108 matches. The breathtaking spectacle saw fans flood social media, with many likening Djokovic's win over Nadal to scaling Mount Everest.
The 2021 French Open is a Grand Slam tennis tournament being played on outdoor clay courts. It is being held at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France, from 30 May to 13 June 2021, comprising singles, doubles and mixed doubles play.
The qualifiers took place from 24 May to 28 May. Junior and wheelchair tournaments are also scheduled. Rafael Nadal is the four-time defending champion in men's singles, and Iga Świątek is the defending champion in women's singles.It is the 125th edition of the French Open and the second Grand Slam event of 2021.
The main singles draws included 16 qualifiers for men and 16 for women out of 128 players in each draw, the last Grand Slam to still have 128 women qualifiers instead of 96 in line with the other three majors. This was the first edition of the event to have formal night sessions in the schedule, joining a practice already established at the Australian Open and US Open, with one match having a 21:00 local time start time each day. The mixed doubles event returned after a one-year absence, though the draw featured only 16 teams instead of the regular 32. The beginning of the tournament returned to its traditional late-May scheduling after being delayed to September in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
On 8 April, the originally-announced dates were postponed by one week by the French Tennis Federation due to a third national lockdown and curfew in France enacted the week prior, with the first day of qualifiers pushed back to 24 May, and first day of the tournament proper pushed back to 30 May. The postponement was made in the hope that restrictions would be eased in time for the tournament, including potentially allowing spectators. At the start of the tournament, the main courts were capped at 1,000 spectators, and spectators were prohibited after 21:00 nightly due to a curfew.
This caused night sessions matches to be held without spectators. Beginning 9 June, the curfew was moved to 23:00, and centre court was permitted to expand to 5,000 spectators. Somewhat controversially, a crowd of 5,000 spectators was forced to leave mid-match at 23:00 during the quarter-final between Novak Djokovic and Matteo Berrettini, leading to a 15-minute disruption of play. That’s what Novak Djokovic said the other night about Rafael Nadal, the 13-time winner of the French Open and the man he would be facing in the semifinal in just under 48 hours. Djokovic needed his best, and then some, Friday night as he beat Nadal on the court he has treated like his living room since 2005.
The score, 3-6, 6-3, 7-6, 6-3, reflected a wild match that produced some of the most remarkable tennis in years. In beating Nadal at the French Open, Djokovic pulled off what known as the hardest feat in tennis. Nadal was 105-2 at Roland-Garros and had not lost there since 2015. Djokovic had his number that time too. There is a statue of Nadal outside Court Phillippe Chatrier. During this tournament, his fellow players speak of him with a kind of reverence usually reserved for legends of the past. And that was how Djokovic spoke of his longtime rival moments after Nadal’s final backhand sailed wide.
“The first thing I want to say was it was my privilege also to be on the court with Rafa for this incredible match,” Djokovic said. “It is surely the greatest match I have played here in Paris.”
Djokovic will face Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece in the final on Sunday. Tsitsipas will be playing in his first Grand Slam singles final. Djokovic will be playing for his 19th Grand Slam singles title. A win would bring him within one of Nadal and Roger Federer, who are tied with 20. It would also put him in solid position to win all four Grand Slams in a single year, something that no man has accomplished in more than 50 years. He won the Australian Open in February and he is the defending champion at Wimbledon, which begins in two weeks.
It is a title he has won five times, and he has won 12 Grand Slam titles on hard courts, including three at the United States Open, which will take place in New York at the end of the summer. It was a match that had everything, even a looming curfew of 11 p.m. that threatened to send the crowd of 5,000 people home in the middle of an epic duel.
