Novak Djokovic had to battle ‘inner demons’ before competing against Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Andy Murray for the big title, according to Boris Becker.
The former coach of Djokovic, Becker started working with Serb at the start of 2014 when he had just 6 Grand Slam titles and after the end of Becker’s the tally was doubled to a dozen.
Becker narrated their first interaction when the Serb reached out, “We spoke, I said, ‘I am too old to bulls**t you.’”
He continued, “It gets personal, I’m like do you want your mother to cry or do you want his mother to cry? You’re a proud Serbian, you’re a proud family man, you would do anything to protect your family. That’s how you have to be. That’s the attitude.”
Becker, a three-time Wimbledon champion, mentioned the Serb’s biggest rivals at the time against whom he had lost multiple Grand Slam finals.
“Rafa wants to do the same, Roger wants to do the same and Andy [Murray] wants to do the same. They want to protect their families. So now go out and do it.”
The German added, “Then we still had to overcome a couple of inner demons that I can’t talk about. Why you faltered at the last hurdle.”
Novak Djokovic vs Nadal, Murray and Federer (before and after 2014)
Djokovic’s resurrection against Federer, Nadal and Murray is very visible after he started working with Becker in 2014.
Novak vs Nadal Head-to-Head: 30-29
Versus Nadal before 2014: 17-22
Versus Nadal after 2014: 13-7
Novak Djokovic vs Federer overall: 27-23
Versus Federer before 2014: 15-16
Versus Federer after 2014: 12-7
Novak Djokovic vs Murray overall: 25-11
Djokovic vs Murray before 2014: 11-8
Djokovic vs Murray after 2014: 14-3
The 22-time Grand Slam champion himself also commented on the Becker effect:
“We did talk about all the off-court activities that could be favorable and also the other ones that are actually a distraction.”
Djokovic added, “He asked me, so what do you want from tennis? Do you have clarify of your goals? So I said of course, I want to write the history of the sport and I want to do it with you so we clicked right away.”
The Serb referred to his 2014 Wimbledon final victory against Federer as an example of Becker’s role coming into play, “Having him there, – he was just so serene, he was just so strong and he stood his ground. He knows exactly what I’m going through.”
Djokovic continued, “Okay, I’m back here again where I need to be and focused on the next point. Throughout the match there was a lot of oscillations, right? In those most important moments having Boris there just gave me that fuel and that extra inch to overcome the challenge.”
“14 [2014] was in a way a springboard, the big opening that was a huge wind in the sails that allowed us to really have an incredible run in the next two and a half years,” said Djokovic.