No ‘miracle pills’ required as flawless Novak Djokovic lays down Wimbledon title marker

Sometimes Novak Djokovic doesn’t need a miracle to win at Wimbledon. There’s enough inspiration, divine or otherwise, from his racket to easily swat away those who have the misfortune to cross his path.

That was the situation Dan Evans found himself in on Centre Court as he watched the winners, all 46 of them,fly past him. Fresh off a confidence-boosting straight-sets win over fellow Brit Jay Clarke in round one, Evans simply couldn’t compete in a 6-3, 6-2, 6-0 defeat that took just one hour and 47 minutes.

Forty-eight hours after Djokovic’s four-set victory over Alexandre Muller that was harder than he would have liked it to be, even requiring some “miracle pills” to get through a stomach issue, this was exactly what the doctor ordered – no tablets required.

If the 38-year-old’s body is more fragile and unreliable than it used to be, then saving as many bullets as possible for the potential Draper, Sinner and Alcaraz-shaped tests to come is a useful strategy in the quest for that record-breaking 25th grand slam.

What’s also a useful strategy is playing almost flawless tennis. He gave the impression of a man easily shifting through the gears for the challenges ahead, with consistently sublime shot-making while exuding calm control. “I knew exactly what I needed to do and I executed it perfectly,” admitted a quietly content Djokovic in his post-match interview. “Sometimes you have these kinds of days where everything goes your way.”

Evans meanwhile – roared on by a raucous crowd on Centre, desperate for further British success – fought valiantly enough, especially early on as he denied Djokovic on break point after break point in the first set, but the gulf in class was ultimately too great to overcome.

His unbeaten record against the Serbian star (thanks to winning their lone previous meeting, an unlikely clay-court triumph at the 2021 Monte Carlo Masters…) predictably meant little and he’ll now go back to grinding away on the Challenger Tour in pursuit of a US Open spot as his opponent prepares for a third-round tussle with countryman Miomir Kecmanovic and dreams of tennis history.

The semi-regular approving taps of the racket from Djokovic when an Evans shot was just too good for him didn’t appear to be a deliberate psychological ploy, and couldn’t quite be called patronising, but it’s likely they would have become a shade more infrequent had the 35-year-old Brit been able to really push the all-time great close.

Instead, he battled and showed plenty of glimpses of the quality that took him to a career-high 21 in the world just two summers ago – certainly enough to suggest that a rise from his current position languishing outside the world’s top 150 is imminent – but ultimately to little avail.

If Evans wanted to make an early statement that he could hang with the seven-time champion, a Djokovic hold to love to kick things off was hardly ideal. But he at least earned the smallest of bragging rights by banging down back-to-back clean aces to begin his first service game after his Serbian foe had merely followed an opening ace with an unreturned serve.

Knowing he would be outgunned in ferocity of groundstroke, the Brit tried to make life difficult with clever changes of pace, resorting especially to his patented sliced backhand, well-placed serves and frequent darts to the net.

Four break points were saved in the fourth game of the match for a gutsy hold before Evans dug himself out of a 0-40 hole next time around to again stave off the Djokovic swarm for a few more minutes.

But the elastic eventually snapped at 4-3. A 15-40 fightback was rendered moot when Djokovic, at the 10th time of asking, finally converted a break point as a forehand drifted long. The subsequent hold was routine and in roughly three-quarters of an hours, a 6-3 first-set triumph was secured. The next two sets combined only took a little longer than that.

The fact the 24-time grand slam winner had lost just three points on serve, and in fact only needed to resort to a second serve on three occasions throughout the entire first set, told the story of the dominance.

He kicked on from there. An early break was secured in the third game of the second set, another added when the man from Birmingham next served and a 6-2 win was wrapped up before the match time reached an hour and 20 minutes.

Incredibly, his serve was getting better – 100 per cent of first serves that landed in the box during the second set ended with Djokovic winning the point, while he lost just two of five second serves.

And the third set turned into a rout as Evans wilted, unable to stop the relentless onslaught, failing to win a single game as his opponent positively sprinted through the finish line.

This was vintage Novak. A 99th win on the Wimbledon grass and a promise that it might just take divine intervention to stop him making history at the All England Club this year.