Goran Ivanisevic is no longer Novak Djokovic's coach, and the Croatian sat down for their first interview since their split.
Since Djokovic and Ivanisevic parted ways, many pundits and former players shared their opinions about their split, but only the two know what really happened.
Immediately after their split, the 24-time major winner assured everyone that there was not bad blood between the two, as they maintain good relationship even after ending their professional one.
Now, talking to Sasa Ozmo, Ivanisevic talked about their split, and revealed a "real" reason, as he said no one got close to predicting why they parted ways.
"Well I read a lot of those… I repeat again, people just have to write something, unfortunately no one was even close to getting it. I mean, there isn’t really a “real” reason. One reason is indeed a sense of saturation/fatigue, this really was a difficult and intense five years."
According to Ivanisevic, many people forget the mentally draining period they have to go through together, as especially for Djokovic, the COVID-19 years on the ATP Tour have been incredibly draining and it left a dent also on his team.
"People forget that period during the coronavirus, they forget that he was at one moment labelled as the greatest villain on the planet because of his vaccination status. So then we weren’t allowed in this country, then that country, then we travel over here…"
"I mean, we were always in some sort of limbo – playing, not playing, ready again, then changing restrictions which forbid us from playing and we can’t travel there. Not to mention Australia and all of that mayhem."
The Croatian coach put it quite simply. According to Ivanisevic, he just became tired of Djokovic, and the Serbian became tired of him, which is normal in professional relationship like these, and that's why they split.
"So yes, we reached a certain level of saturation, as I like to say: “material fatigue”, just as a car needs a regular service and tune up, basically I became tired of him, he became tired of me; in any case I didn’t feel like I could help him anymore. Even so, when we add it all up together, we achieved great things for ourselves and for tennis."
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