Novak Djokovic only gives coaches 'seconds to explain' as axed team member speaks out
Novak Djokovic is currently working without an official full-time coach.
Goran Ivanisevic has opened up on the brutal pressure of coaching Novak Djokovic months after they ended their successful partnership. The world No. 1 has given his team an overhaul in recent months, also getting rid of his fitness trainer while his two long-time agents stepped back at the end of last year. And Ivanisevic explained that he only had seconds to explain things to Djokovic when he was asked.
Djokovic and Ivanisevic parted ways in March following a conversation in Miami. “Our on court chemistry had its ups and downs, but our friendship was always rock solid,” the 24-time Grand Slam champion wrote as he announced their split.
The pair were known for their frosty interactions during matches, as Djokovic often shouted at Ivanisevic in his box. It’s something that both men have addressed in the past and Ivanisevic has now opened up on just how much pressure he faced when coaching the greatest player of all time.
“Well, when you train Novak Djokovic, anything other than winning the title at any tournament is a failure. That's a lot of pressure to deal with,” the Croat told Blick. As well as the external stress, Djokovic also demanded a lot of his coach.
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Ivanisevic continued: “Novak is very demanding. Something new has to happen every day, he always wants to get better. If you can't handle it, it's better not to take the job at all. The language certainly helped me – we had no barrier between us.
“With Novak it's like this, you only have a few seconds to explain something to him. He then wants to know 15 things from you at once, but you only have three seconds to do it. So you have to try to summarise everything in some clever way. It can be hard, but I enjoyed it with Novak.”
While Ivanisevic felt the heat when he had to explain things to Djokovic after a match, he was happy to take the world No. 1’s outbursts on the chin in the middle of competition. “He yelled at me again and everyone saw it. Sometimes I could understand him well in the stadium, but sometimes not,” the 2001 Wimbledon winner said.
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Instead, Ivanisevic tried not to get involved and let Djokovic figure things out. He added: “Maybe he wanted to know something about the service - and then I told him something about the clouds that were just over the arena. Then Novak got upset with me.
“But at least it was related to me. And after five minutes it shut down again. He was able to let everything out and then he was free again. Sometimes in tennis you need a quick shock to hit a reset button in your head. I think the mental component is the most important factor in this sport.”
Ivanisevic has still not been officially replaced as Djokovic is currently without a full-time coach. But he has been working with former doubles No. 1 Nenad Zimonjic over the last few weeks, with the Serb joining him at the Monte-Carlo Masters and Italian Open.