Wimbledon crowd should show Novak Djokovic more respect after fifth title, says Boris Becker

1/176
Tom Dutton15 July 2019

Boris Becker has called on tennis fans to show Novak Djokovic the respect he deserves after the Serb claimed his 16th Grand Slam at Wimbledon on Sunday.

Djokovic edged a marathon final to win his fifth SW19 crown, saving two championship points to beat Roger Federer in five sets.

The longest singles final in Wimbledon history ebbed and flowed as Federer twice fought back from a set down before breaking his opponent's serve late in the decisive set.

But the eight-time Wimbledon champion, who was cheered on by a partisan crowd on Centre Court, failed to win his next service game and Djokovic went on to win the first final-set tie-break in Wimbledon finals history.

"Federer is the greatest of all-time here and has the right to get that love, but on the other side you have to respect a four-time champion a little bit more," Becker told the BBC.

"I hope next year, if they played again, it would be more even.

"He came into the party that was the Roger and Rafa party and he became the party pooper.

"Now, after 16 majors, people have got to wake up to the greatness of Novak Djokovic."

Djokovic was jeered by sections of the Centre Court crowd as he complained to chair umpire Damian Steiner after a delayed challenge from Federer.

Getty Images

But the Serb, 32, otherwise kept his cool as he closed to within four of Federer's Grand Slam haul, extending his dominant recent record in Majors.

Djokovic has now won four of the last five Slams and heads to New York in August as the US Open defending champion.

"Novak is not quite happy yet," Becker said. "He's one of the greatest of all of time but he wants to be the greatest of all time.

"He should be more than proud to have achieved 16 majors. If you told him that 15 years ago he would have said 'I don't believe you' and he would have taken one or two."

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in