It is tempting to suggest that Roberto Bautista Agut’s best chance of stopping Novak Djokovic in the semi-finals at Wimbledon would be if the world No 1 has a dodgy meal the night before. The Spaniard is into the semi-finals of a grand slam championship for the first time while the defending champion is trying to join an elite band of men to win the title here five times or more.
While the presence of Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal in the other semi-final was no surprise, few expected Bautista Agut to be taking part in Friday’s first match on Centre Court – certainly not the 31-year-old, who had scheduled his stag do for this weekend before he started winning. But he is there, having beaten Guido Pella in the quarter-finals on Wednesday and, having defeated Djokovic twice this year – on hard courts in both Doha and Miami – he has more hope than most.
However, watching Djokovic in practice on Thursday was to see a man perfectly at ease with his game and his surroundings, happy to round things off with a game where he and his team tried to throw a ball and stop it exactly on the baseline. His game looks in perfect nick and it will take something extra special from the No 23 seed to stop the Serb from reaching the final for the sixth time.
Not many people beat Djokovic twice in a row but his coach, Marian Vajda, said he thought those two victories for the Spaniard this year would have little or no impact on their semi-final.
“His aim was different for this season, more grand slams,” Vajda said. “He was not really focusing in those matches, I think. He was particularly not ready in Doha [before the] Australian Open and in Miami he was not there for that match; he was not ready. Here he’s really well prepared and everything and the grass suits him so much.”
