Djokovic and Fritz voice concerns after another late finish at Australian Open
Novak Djokovic and Taylor Fritz have raised the alarm over Australian Open scheduling after Tuesday’s quarter-final matches ran on into the early hours of Wednesday morning.
Organisers took steps this year to address complaints from players about late finishes, beginning the tournament a day early and limiting the number of daytime matches.
But problems persist, with Tuesday’s play continuing long after midnight for the eighth time in 10 days and some matches earlier in the Grand Slam finishing after 3am.
Fritz made his concerns plain after a 7-6 (7-3) 4-6 6-2 6-3 defeat to defending champion Novak Djokovic which lasted almost four hours and delayed Jannik Sinner’s match with Andrey Rublev.
“It just screws up your whole clock. I pray for those guys,” said American Fritz. “I get it, matches go long some days. Like today my match was long, the match before us was really long.
“But there’s got to be something they can do where people aren’t playing until 2, 3am, because I don’t think people really fully understand how much time we actually have to spend doing stuff after we finish playing. If you finish at 2am, there is no chance I’m going to sleep until 5, 6am.”
Djokovic acknowledged that an extra day’s rest in between rounds at Grand Slams helped to mitigate but emphasised that late finishes were bad for players.
“We’ve seen in the past some late finishes, and I know for the crowds and for the tournament in a way it’s exciting to see a 4am or 3am finish. I was part of some of those,” Djokovic said. “But it’s definitely not fun for us.”
Women’s champion Aryna Sabalenka also reached the last four, where she will play her US Open final conqueror Coco Gauff, after beating Barbora Krejcikova 6-2 6-3.
Gauff stayed on course for successive Grand Slam titles with an error-strewn 7-6 (8-6) 6-7 (4-7) 6-2 victory over Ukraine’s Marta Kostyuk.