Generational Rivalry: Carlos Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner evenly split four majors in back-to-back seasons

It wasn’t easy—he dropped the first set—but Novak Djokovic bounced back to reach the semifinals of Wimbledon on Tuesday, defeating Andrey Rublev in the quarterfinals, 4-6, 6-1, 6-4, 6-3.

Djokovic now achieves a big milestone: he's through to his 46th Grand Slam semifinal, tying Roger Federer’s all-time men’s record.

MOST GRAND SLAM SEMIFINALS (men, all-time)

46: Novak Djokovic
46: Roger Federer
38: Rafael Nadal
31: Jimmy Connors
28: Ivan Lendl

Djokovic already holds the all-time men’s records for most Grand Slam titles (23) and most Grand Slam finals (34).

And if recent history is anything to go by, he’s only going to get more dangerous as the rounds go by—he’s won 20 of his last 21 Grand Slam semifinals, which dates back to the start of 2015, and he’s won 15 of his last 18 Grand Slam finals, a run that began midway into 2015.

With his victory over Rublev, Djokovic has now won 15 of his last 16 Grand Slam quarterfinals.

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Djokovic has been unbeatable at the majors over the last year, winning the last three he’s played—Wimbledon last year, then the Australian Open and Roland Garros this year—so when Rublev drew first blood with a break for 5-4 in the opening set and held for a one-set lead, it looked like something out of the ordinary was brewing.

But it didn’t take long for the alarm bells to stop sounding, as Djokovic stormed out to a 5-0 lead in the second set and was never really in trouble again—that break at the end of the first set turned out to be the only break the Russian ended up getting the entire match.

Djokovic finished the match with almost twice as many winners as unforced errors, 42 to 23. Even Rublev finished with a positive differential of winners to unforced errors, 32 to 25.

“Great quality match. I think we both played well,” Djokovic said afterwards. “He was coming out from the blocks very, very quick. From baseline, strong, precise shots, particularly from the forehand corner. Putting a lot of pressure on me. As soon as he had an opportunity to step in and take over the control of the rally, he would do that normally with his forehand, we know is his biggest weapon.

“He played a better ending of the first set. He was a set up. But I managed to kind of regroup and break his serve early in the second set. I think that was the key to really switch the momentum to my side.

“After that, some very long games, particularly the one at 5-4 serving for the set. That went ages. He had his chances. I had my chances. I’m very glad to overcome the challenge of Rublev that I feel like he was playing on a very high level. I think this is the best I’ve played him on any Grand Slam that we faced each other.”

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