Djokovic carries belief into decider

Belief – it is a wonderful, if indefinable and unquantifiable, thing. If you could bottle it and sell it, you would make Gina Rinehart look like a pauper. You might even make Midas look cheap. But belief is something Novak Djokovic has in bucketloads.

As the world No.1 prepares for his third Australian Open final, he should, by all accounts, be knackered. On Friday night and on into Saturday morning, he ran and stretched and lunged and leapt for almost five hours to get the better of Andy Murray. It was the best match of the tournament by far and one of the best Grand Slam matches for the best part of some time. It was worthy of a final, in fact. And yet it was only the precursor to the final – now Djokovic has it all to do again against Rafael Nadal.

Nadal, meanwhile, was back at his hotel watching the match with his feet up. His semifinal had been on Thursday so he had an extra day off. Surely that would give him a huge advantage over the tired and aching Serb. Don’t you believe it.

Since he set off on his rise to the top, a journey that began with the US Open final in 2010, gathered speed with the Davis Cup victory at the end of that year and then took off with his win here last January, Djokovic has proved himself to be mentally tougher and physically stronger than any other player. During that time, he has flattened Nadal in six consecutive finals and done so when he has been fresh and ready and when he has been all but exhausted.

“There is no secret it is going to be physical again,” Djokovic said. “I will do my best to recover. I have a day and a half. I will try to get as much sleep and recovery program underway and hope for the best. I think that's going to be crucial, you know, for me to recover and to be able to perform my best, because Rafa is fit.  He's been playing well.  He had an extra day.  He definitely wants to win this title.”

But nobody wants this title more than Djokovic. The belief he gained from that Davis Cup win, a feeling that he could do anything on a tennis court, has somehow given him an extra tank of fuel to draw upon when all hope seems lost. Fair enough, he works himself to a standstill in training to be fit and he monitors his diet – he follows a gluten-free regime – but that belief, that utter confidence in his own abilities, gives him an extra gear, a turbo-drive that he can engage when the chips are down. Djokovic may be weary when he walks back into the Rod Laver Arena on Sunday night but it will not hinder him – he will not let it hinder him.

“I have been in similar situations, let's say, before,” he explained, “where I had the long matches and I'm supposed to play, like, for example, a couple years back with Roger I had a very long match, and then the next day I was supposed to play finals. So, you know, we are familiar with these kind of conditions and situations, so we will try to take the best out of it and recover.”

Ah, yes, those semifinals in New York with Roger. In both of them, the mighty Roger had two match points and in both of them, Djokovic went on to win. Last year, Federer was serving for the match; he had match point; he thought he was on his way to the final. And then Djokovic crushed him. One thundering, outrageous, screaming forehand return later and Federer was Djokovic’s bunny. The Swiss was crushed and the world No.1 was on his way to the final and, eventually, the title.

Afterwards, Federer was still flummoxed by that shot. How had Djokovic pulled it off? How could he, the mighty Swiss, have been beaten by a stroke so outrageous it was almost a trick shot? And how could Djokovic have summoned the confidence and the sheer chutzpah, to try such a shot on match point down in a grand slam semifinal? The answer is simple, Roger: belief. Djokovic just believed it was possible.

“If you're playing somebody like Roger, you have to take your chances when they're presented; otherwise you're losing a match,” Djokovic explained at the time. “I felt it's the moment. You know, it's the moment when I should step in and show what I got, and it paid off.

“That forehand return, I cannot explain you because I don't know how it happened. I read his serve and I was on the ball and I had to hit it hard, and it got in, luckily for me.

“It's obvious that this is the best year of my career, by far. The confidence level that is very high at this moment for me helps me to get into these big matches and go for the shots that, you know, that I maybe in some situations wouldn't, that I wasn't going for those shots in the past couple years.

“But it's all I think a process of learning and getting experience and maturing as a player, as a person. And, yeah, it might have been the case that it helped me in this match, knowing that I have such a great season and knowing that I have such great confidence.”

So now Nadal has to take on that self-belief and find a way to beat it.  Half a dozen losses to the Serb last year will not help his cause but he has been working hard in the off-season to come up with a game plan to win one of these finals. These days, Nadal is being more aggressive, going for winners and trying to force the issue. Then again, that is just what Murray did over the course of nearly five hours on Friday but it was still not enough.

“Rafa’s very much eager and motivated to win the title ‑ as much as I am,” Djokovic said. “It's the final. It's unpredictable what's going to happen.”

And that was about the only thing the defending champion did not believe in. He knows the final will be utterly predictable: it will be physical, it will be brutal and at no point will Djokovic think that he cannot win. That is what belief does for a boy.