Novak Djokovic started his 2024 Paris Olympics journey with a thrashing win over Matthew Ebden, who hasn't played a singles match since 2022.
The Serbian's fans wondered how his first match back on clay would go, considering that the last time we saw him on the red dirt was in a match where he injured his knee.
He found himself on the same court at Roland Garros in this match, but thankfully didn't injure himself and never faced any kind of problems. The draw was very kind to him because it gave him a player who has ended his singles career a while ago.
At his peak, Ebden was a decent singles player, but he's playing only doubles these days. The only reason he found himself in the singles is the bizarre way the Olympics replaces players who withdraw from the event by entering players from the doubles.
That's how Ebden got in, and it was a lucky break for Djokovic, similar to his main rival for the gold medal, Carlos Alcaraz, who got a similar opponent. The 37-year-old opened with an early break and then added another break to take a 4-0 lead.
The Serbian was amazing and dominated the rallies on both sides. He hit the ball really well, totaling 6 winners by the time he took a 4-0 lead. Ebden tried a few things, but even at his peak, the Australian was not a very good player on clay.
He was missing the ball a lot and had 6 unforced errors by the time 4 games concluded. The Australian was largely a bystander in his own match, and at one point, he even offered his racket to one of the fans, showing that he had no idea how to counter his opponent's domination.
Djokovic took a 5-0 lead and won the opening set with a bagel, 6-0, powered by 9 winners and only 4 unforced errors. His opponent, meanwhile, had one winner and 9 unforced winners as the set finished after only 24 minutes.
It was just a domination from Djokovic, but that's not a huge surprise. It was expected because the 24-time major winner is the far better clay player, singles player, and general player.
Djokovic then opened the second set with another break as Ebden was really out of ideas. Whatever he tried didn't work, and Djokovic just had all the answers.
It was, in many ways, peak Djokovic, which we haven't seen for a while. However, we need to see this against a more challenging opponent.
A double bagel was ever closer after Djokovic took a 3-0 lead, which became a 4-0 lead quickly after in the second set. Ebden had a game point in that game, but Djokovic had no mercy.
He was determined to get this over with as quickly as possible. It was just a ruthless display from Djokovic who just had all the solutions.
Eventually, Ebden was able to win a game, but still, Djokovic won the match very easily, triumphing 6-0, 6-1 to start his gold medal charge.
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