Once the dust had settled on his seventh Wimbledon title, Novak Djokovic remained just as clinical in identifying the moments the match began to turn. Djokovic had steadied after dropping the opening set to Nick Kyrgios, like a machine analysing its opponent’s serve and learning new behaviours, and after levelling the match he continued to tighten his grip with a faultless display of hitting from the baseline. The key breakthrough in the third, though, was “presented” to him.
Kyrgios, still reeling from a missed opportunity to break Djokovic from 0-40 at the end of the previous set, looked to be cruising to an important hold at 4-4 in the third. For a player who through the tournament had held 97 per cent of his service games after winning the opening point, being 40-0 up should have been an unassailable lead. But the irritation built, a backhand into the net was followed by a double fault, and at deuce the sight of Kyrgios grumbling to his box was like waving a red flag in front of the bull.
