Boris Becker rips into French Open for 'mad and unprofessional' Novak Djokovic late show
Novak Djokovic's match finished at 3am local time
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Boris Becker has taken aim at French Open organisers after Novak Djokovic's third-round match against Lorenzo Musetti finished at 3am local time.
Roland Garros' schedule this year has been wrecked through the first week of the tournament due to heavy rain.
Inclement weather affected Saturday's order of play, which originally had Djokovic and Musetti set to play at around 8pm.
To avoid more delays and postponements, tournament organisers pushed Grigor Dimitrov's match with Zizou Bergs onto the Philippe Chatrier which delayed Djokovic's match.
Novak Djokovic's match finished at 3am local time
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The Serbian tennis icon didn't get on to court until 11pm local time with a race against time into the early hours of the morning.
He came up against No 30 seed Musetti who threatened a huge upset after taking a 2-1 lead after the third set.
But Djokovic was able to find another gear to turn things around before winning the fifth with a bagel.
The match didn't end until 3.08am local time with Djokovic surprised to see so many fans still inside the arena.
“It’s incredible that you’re here at this time in the morning,” Djokovic told the fans in his on-court interview.
“There’s children here who should be sleeping.”
Mark Petchey noted on social media that Djokovic's late finish may end up costing him in the long run.
"If @DjokerNole wins @rolandgarros it will be his greatest achievement ever in a single event," he said.
"Madness to finish at 3am from a recovery point of view.
"When a tournament is struggling this much to catch up through no fault of its own, they should just call a Monday Final early so this doesn’t happen."
Boris Becker was unimpressed by the late finish
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Becker, who coached Djokovic for three years, took it further and slammed the French Open organisers for allowing the match to go on that late.
"Mark, you make very good point!" Becker wrote on X.
"Think it’s mad and frankly unprofessional from the organisers to allow matches past 1am …which other sport has to deal with something similar?
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"Maybe boxing but they have 1 fight every 6 months!"
French Open organisers introduced night sessions back in 2021 to try and combat weather delays and numerous matches have finished after midnight.
But Djokovic's match against Musetti was the latest finish in French Open history with the previous record being 1.26am.