Is there a harder thing to do in sport than the calendar grand slam?
Winning the Tour de France looks nothing short of self-induced pedal torture. Matching the Don’s batting average has so far proven woefully impossible.
And regularly beating the All Blacks has been permanently placed in the ‘too hard basket’.
In tennis, winning the calendar year grand slam is the ultimate peak a player can scale. Legends are made even when they collect them sporadically to achieve the ‘career slam’.
Since the Open Era began in 1968, only one man has achieved the calendar-year grand slam. Djokovic was starting his 2016 bid in the very stadium named after him.
Rodney George Laver achieved the feat in 1969, having already done it before the Open Era in 1962. Back in those days, both the US Open and Australian Open were also played on grass along with Wimbledon, while the French Open remains the ultimate clay-court prize.
There have been several seasons since then that someone has come agonisingly close to this triumph. McEnroe’s 1984 was one of the most dominant ever despite skipping the Australian Open and losing a French Open final to Ivan Lendl in five sets.
The 90s provided too much variety for any man to come close. However, since courts all play similar today and playing styles are predominately baseliners, the chance to pull it off is slightly better.
Roger Federer was one match away in 2006 and 2007 but fell to his Spanish nemesis, Rafael Nadal, in the French Open final on each occasion.
More recently, Novak Djokovic came just as close in 2015, where a huge upset to the mercurial Stan Wawrinka in the French Open final meant that Laver’s record was safe to gather dust for one more year.
This year, however, the Serbian’s stars have aligned to give Djokovic the clearest path to grand slam glory I’ve seen since I started following tennis.
Below are five reasons the Djoker will pull it off in 2016.
1) He’s playing even better now than he was last year
It’s a scary thought to think he could have taken his game to another level from last year’s utter domination, but he has. His return is the biggest weapon in tennis at the moment, and most players are starting points on their own serve on the defensive.
With his court coverage and lack of a clear weakness, he has the ultimate modern game to beat anyone on tour again and again.
2) His rivals are getting worse
As if to compound the issue, all of Djokovic’s main rivals are heading in the wrong direction on the form-sheet.
Federer’s age is catching up with him ever so slightly; he has more off days and lacks the power and consistency his younger body so beautifully delivered.
Nadal’s game is also showing major signs of physical and mental wear-and-tear, his style finally taking its toll after many seasons of bullying lesser foes into the dust.
Andy Murray is the world’s second-best player, yet there is daylight between him and Djokovic in ranking points and level of play.
He is simply a poor man’s Djokovic. That is no disrespect to the Scot; it’s just that Novak is that good at being a counter-punching baseliner.
3) He still has the hunger
After his successful Australian Open campaign, Djokovic is keen to stay on top of the rankings and continue his domination of the sport.
“I heard a nice metaphor yesterday about the wolf running up the hill being much hungrier than the wolf standing on top of the hill,” he told reporters.
“I believe that all the guys that are out there fighting each week to get to number one are very hungry to get to number one and I know that…
“I think you need to work twice as hard when you’re up there.”
4) The ‘lost’ generation isn’t challenging him
When Federer was dominating, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray were nipping at his heels as youngsters on tour. By comparison, Djokovic has not been as troubled by Grigor Dimitrov, Milos Raonic and Kei Nishikori – the most promising players four to five years younger than Novak.
5) Court surfaces are very similar today
Whereas the 90s provided us with all the flavours tennis could offer, the playing styles and surfaces in modern tennis today can best be described as vanilla.
Serve-and-volley is under cardiac arrest, with Federer one of the few on hand to revive it somewhat successfully.
With Wimbledon no longer providing the low-skidding bounce volleyers dreamt of, and hard courts slowing down in recent years, it is a counter-punchers paradise out there and Djokovic will be licking his lips once more.
It’s a long year and as the man said himself, there are many wolves running up his hill. Unfortunately for them, Djokovic is proving to be a Serbian bear standing head and shoulders above the rest.
Possibly harder than winning the grand slam right now, is someone beating Djokovic himself.
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