What did Novak Djokovic do in the pre-season that helped him get past Sinner and makes him favourite against Alcaraz

Marion Bartoli, former world number one and Wimbledon champion, explained how 24-time Grand Slam champion charted his way into yet another Australian Open final this year.

2 min readUpdated: Feb 1, 2026 01:57 PM IST

Novak Djokovic is looking at another date with history on Sunday at the Australian Open. (AP Photo)

Marion Bartoli, former world number one and Wimbledon champion had spent time with Novak Djokovic during his pre-season training camp in Dubai ahead of the 2026 season, and told Tennis.com what he was working on.

She narrated that Djokovic had done everything to stay on level with the two young rivals. “Novak shows immense intelligence, knowing he had to close the gap on the level of Jannik and Carlos, and therefore work even harder,” she told Tennis.com.

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Late-night sessions in the gym proved useful, she said, adding, “That’s exactly what he did in the pre-season in Dubai, hitting the court every day—where I was lucky enough to watch some of his training sessions—staying in the gym until late at night, putting in the effort to identify what he was missing.”

It’s what assured her that could help him even as the semifinal against Sinner stretched to five, well past midnight. “He managed to elevate his game to another level. I was convinced he could do it, even if the challenge was enormous. This performance is just like him, just like his career,” said the Frenchwoman, Tennis.com adding that those little adjustments eventually helped him reach the Australian Open final.

The fifth set could well have gone Sinner’s way, but Djokovic pulled out some epic serves to deny him the break point conversions.

“It illustrates this constant ability—as very few players can manage—to adapt. He saved all those break points in the fifth set (eight in total). Down 0-40 after breaking serve, he fired a second serve at 189 km/h down the T, followed by an extremely tough lob to handle,” Bartoli explained.

“It’s 1 a.m., you’ve been grinding for 4 hours, it’s a shot where he could falter, and he pulls off an exceptional smash. It’s pure Djokovic: an infinite capacity to reinvent himself, to find solutions, to tap every last mental, physical, and tennis resource,” she was quoted as saying by Tennis.com.