02:11 PM
Djokovic 6-6 Berrettini*
Back to back forehand errors by Berrettini, 15-30. Berrettini serve and volley winner, 30-30. With the power of his first serve, he should do that way more often.
Djokovic sliced backhand wide, 40-30. But Berrettini slices into the net, deuce. Brave forehand down the line winner by Berrettini. Just clipped the line. Defensive Djokovic backhand long and we have a tiebreak.
That didn’t look like happening earlier.
02:05 PM
Djokovic* 6-5 Berrettini
Normal service resumed on the Djokovic serve as he moves to 40-0 in no time at all. And he holds to love when Berrettini puts a backhand return long.
02:03 PM
Djokovic 5-5 Berrettini*
Errors starting to flow for Djokovic. Berrettini body serve puts Djokovic down and he finishes with a forehand winner, 40-0.
Djokovic doesn’t go away yet as he drags his opponent along the baseline and draws the error. But another big serve by Berrettini and he holds.
02:00 PM
Djokovic* 5-4 Berrettini
Berrettini forehand winner to start the game. He’s certainly got the fans on his side. Berrettini drop shot in the net, poor shot selection there.
Berrettini backhand wide, 30-15. Berrettini forehand is called out but he challenges and the ball was in, 30-30.
Djokovic forehand wide, just his seventh unforced error of the match, break point Berrettini.
Djokovic forehand winner, deuce. Djokovic forehand into the net, second break point.
Rally of the match sees Djokovic hit a nice angled drop shot but Berrettini reaches it and flicks it down the line for a winner. Centre Court erupts. Back on serve. Game on?
01:52 PM
Djokovic 5-3 Berrettini*
Berrettini overhead into the net, 0-15. Djokovic then outfoxes him at the net, 15-30. Berrettini ace, 30-30.
Another big serve makes it 40-30. But another error takes the game to deuce. Berrettini backhand into the tramlines, set point Djokovic.
Djokovic forehand return long, deuce, a let-off for Berrettini. Djokovic is seeing the ball like a huge beach ball on Berrettini serve. Getting the ball back with ease at the moment. Longest game of the match as Djokovic refuses to give up the game.
But after 12 minutes Berrettini finally holds. He’s not serve and volleyed once in the match.
01:39 PM
Djokovic* 5-2 Berrettini
After a shaky start, Djokovic is imperious right now as he cruises to 40-0. He then gets a drop shot just wrong but holds after Berrettini hits a forehand return long.
01:36 PM
Djokovic 4-2 Berrettini*
Berrettini holds to 30. An important hold given Djokovic is moving through the gears at the moment.
01:32 PM
Djokovic* 4-1 Berrettini
Berrettini inexplicably puts a forehand wide, 30-0. Berrettini with back to back returns into the net.
Djokovic holds to consolidate the break.
01:29 PM
Djokovic 3-1 Berrettini*
Djokovic is already targetting the Berrettini backhand and draws another error, 15-15. Berrettini forehand into the net, 15-30. Big first serve by Berrettini, 30-30. Longest rally of the match ends with Berrettini putting a lob wide, break point.
Big first serve by the Italian, deuce. Djokovic forehand winner, second break point. Berrettini forehand wide and Djokovic breaks.
01:23 PM
Djokovic* 2-1 Berrettini
Djokovic dropshot into the net and then a third double fault, 0-30. Berrettini backhand into the net, 15-30.
Berrettini forehand long, 30-30. Djokovic ace, his first of the match. Another big serve down the T and Djokovic holds.
01:20 PM
Djokovic 1-1 Berrettini*
Berrettini gets to 30-0 then puts a forehand long. He then nets a forehand. Djokovic is of course the better player from the baseline.
Berrettini overhead winner after a big wide forehand, 40-30. And he holds to level the set. Confident start.
01:16 PM
First set: Novak Djokovic* 1-0 Matteo Berrettini (*denotes server)
Double fault by Djokovic on the opening point. Nervous Novak? Then a forehand into the tramlines, 15-30.
Berrettini must make the most of every chance he gets. Berrettini backhand into the net, 30-30.
Another Djokovic double fault, break point Berrettini. Big first serve from Djokovic, deuce.
Limiting the errors on his backhand side will be key for Berrettini. He nets another to concede the game.
01:08 PM
Coin toss
Djokovic will serve first. Meanwhile, there is strapping on Berrettini’s left thigh. That wasn’t there before today…
01:02 PM
Here we go
Huge reception for both players as they walk onto Centre Court.
12:59 PM
Djokovic backing Italy over England in Euro 2020
“Football and tennis, Mamma Mia Italia, it’s fantastic!” Djokovic told Sky Sport Italia.
“Berrettini doesn’t have much to lose against me, perhaps Italy have more to lose with England. “I hope it’s a wonderful couple of matches and that Italy only win in the evening!”
12:57 PM
Will Djokovic win a 20th Grand Slam title?
Well, it would mean everything. That’s why I’m here. That’s why I’m playing. I imagined myself being in a position to fight for another Grand Slam trophy prior to coming to London. I put myself in a very good position.
Anything is possible in the finals. Obviously experience is on my side. But Berrettini has been winning a lot of matches on grass courts this year, winning Queen’s. He’s in great form. He’s serving big, playing big. So it’s going to be a very tough match I think for both of us. But I’m looking forward to a great battle.
12:53 PM
Back for more Tom?
12:46 PM
Tale of the tape: Berrettini
Age: 25
Nationality: Italian
Height: 6ft 5in
World ranking: 9
Career singles titles: 5
Career prize money: $6.5million
Grand Slam titles: 0
Wimbledon best: Final 2021
12:40 PM
Tale of the tape: Djokovic
Age: 34
Nationality: Serbian
Height: 6ft 2in
World ranking: 1
Career singles titles: 84
Career prize money: $149.8million
Grand Slam titles: 19
Wimbledon best: Winner 2011, 2014, 2015, 2018, 2019
12:35 PM
Berrettini fairytale
“I’m just so, so happy for everything,” he said. “My year started in a good way, with the finals in ATP Cup. Then I got injured again. I kind of saw those ghosts again of my body kind of struggling.
“Again, I came back stronger. I think I fully deserve to be here. I want to enjoy my first final. “Obviously the job is not done yet. I want to get the trophy now that I’m here. But it’s really an unbelievable feeling.”
12:22 PM
Players warming up
12:15 PM
Serving wars
Berrettini has been serving like an Italian God in the tournament but he now comes up against the best returner in the history of the sport.
“With big weapons in serve and forehand, he can play well, which he has proven, on any surface,” said Djokovic of Berrettini. “We played against each other in the quarters of Roland Garros, which was a very tight and very tough four-setter. Obviously grass favours him even more, favours his game. If he serves big, as he did throughout the entire tournament, it’s tough to break his serve, it’s tough to go into the rhythm, to find a good positioning to return, make him play.
“But I believe in my return. I think return has served me very well throughout my career. Hopefully I’ll be able to get a lot of those serves back and wait for my chances. I will have to also serve myself efficiently. It’s the final. It’s really anybody’s game. He’s arguably the guy who has been in the best form on grass courts this year, winning Queen’s. He’s red hot. It’s going to be a great battle.”
12:01 PM
Wimbledon history
Marija Cicak will be the first ever female chair umpire for a Wimbledon men’s singles final. The tournament, first played in 1877, has never had a female officiate but the 43-year-old from Croatia, will be in charge today.
Cicak is a gold badge chair umpire and a member of the WTA Elite Team since 2012. She was the chair umpire for the 2014 Wimbledon women’s final and the women’s doubles final three years later. Cicak also officiated the women’s singles gold medal match at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics.
She has worked at 15 consecutive Wimbledon tournaments.
11:46 AM
Hello!
The abiding image from Matteo Berrettini’s semi-final victory on Friday was the despairing body language of his father Luca, who sat hunched over in the player’s box like a man suffering from acute seasickness.
But if Luca found it difficult to watch his son ease past Hubert Hurkacz in four relatively serene sets, how will he cope today? From 2pm on Centre Court, Matteo will try to do something that no man of his generation has done before: defeat Novak Djokovic in a major final.
This is the tennis equivalent of crossing the Atlantic on a lilo. Djokovic’s record tells us that he is all but invincible in the big matches, and at Wimbledon too. The last man to beat the Serbian here when he was fit and firing was Andy Murray, all the way back in 2013.
Nobody has a great deal of faith in Berrettini’s chances. Perhaps not even his father. But as the first Italian to reach a Wimbledon final, he has already exceeded expectations.
“They always said, ‘When the going gets tough, the Italians go shopping,’ ” quipped Pat Cash, the 1987 champion here. “Not in this guy’s case. He’s a great competitor.
“I do think Berrettini has a shot at this,” the Australian added.
“He’s not as complete a player as [Stefanos] Tsitsipas but the grass just gives him another leg up. I mean, his serve and forehand are monster shots, like [Andy] Roddick, but this is almost another level. I can’t think of a better one-two combination.”
At 6ft 5in, Berrettini fits into a pattern of modern Wimbledon finalists. Over the past decade, only four men from outside the “Big Four” have played a trophy match, and each one has been a giant with a cannon for a right arm: Milos Raonic, Marin Cilic, Kevin Anderson and now Berrettini. In the tournament to date, he has pinged down 101 aces – 36 more than Denis Shapovalov in second place – and given up only five breaks of serve.
This is the same sort of alpha-male tennis that carried him to the title at Queen’s three weeks ago. If anything, though, his return stats are even more striking. Berrettini is winning 28 per cent of games on his opponent’s serve, only a tick behind Djokovic’s 29 per cent.
And Djokovic – who is going for a 20th major title today to draw level with the tallies of Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal – is renowned as the greatest returner the game has seen. Are there any chinks in the Djokovic armour? Not in a technical sense.
“The only small element of vulnerability is sometimes when he feels the crowd is against him,” said Wimbledon legend Tim Henman yesterday.
“There have been times when that frustrates him. That goes back to his desire to be loved as well as the best player that has ever lived.
“I commentated on his third-round match against [Denis] Kudla,” Henman added. “He was up a set and a break, and suddenly he was raging at the crowd. The only way that Berrettini could win is that Djokovic has to get distracted and frustrated. That would have a detrimental effect on his performance.”
Although Djokovic remained calm and controlled during his own semi-final against Shapovalov, managing the big points with his usual clinical efficiency, he certainly became riled up against Kudla – who admitted afterwards that “it was part of the tactics, to use the crowd and try to get him flustered” – on the first Friday of this tournament.
And that was against a man ranked outside the world’s top 100. Berrettini will be a different proposition. He discomfited Djokovic enough in their recent French Open quarter-final to draw another of those bug-eyed roars of defiance from his opponent at the conclusion of their four-set match.
And that was on a surface that drains much of the energy from his 139mph serve and blood-curdling forehand. On grass, these shots skim through much more quickly, like stones skipping over the pellucid surface of a lake. Even Djokovic, whose flexibility and sliding movement allow him to retrieve balls that other players would give up for lost, is likely to be stressed by Berrettini’s relentless bombardment.
There might even be a case for Luca to suppress his queasy anxiety and rise to his feet every time his son fires down an ace, whipping up the crowd in the hope of upsetting Djokovic’s fabled concentration. In a rare exception to the national stereotype, Berrettini is not a football enthusiast.
But he had a nice answer ready on Friday, when asked about the synchronicity of today’s match with the final of the European Football Championships.
“I will tell them [fans at home] to buy a nice TV if they don’t have one already because I think it’s going to be a special Sunday for all of us. “It’s something crazy. In tennis, because it’s never happened [an Italian in a Wimbledon singles final]. Then for football, we didn’t qualify for the World Cup, so after the effort that the team put in, I think they really deserve this final.
“Obviously I’m going to think first about mine. Then probably, if I have the chance, I’m going to watch them.”
By Simon Briggs