The small Serbian nation had quite the week, as they won both the ATP Finals (Djokovic) and the NextGen Finals (Medjedovic).
Djokovic has had quite the career, but what he did this year is hard to fathom to be honest. He somehow managed to play 11 times this season, and yet still finish as the Year End #1 and did so by nearly 2500 points!?!!? Keep this in mind only 15 players this season accumulated that many points for the entire season!!! In those 11 events, he won 3 slams, this weeks YEC, and 2 Masters 1000 events (Paris and Cincinnati), and lost in the finals of Wimbledon to Alcaraz. To say that he ended the season strong is the understatement of the world, as he reached the final of every event he entered from Rome onward (yes, Rome was played in MAY!).
Djokovic has won many events over the years, but this win will be something that he'll probably never forget. After he played his final Round Robin match of the week, he was fully aware that his fate was out of his hands - nothing like knowing that you require help in order to survive the Round Robin. Facts were simple though, if Sinner beat Rune, he would make the SemiFinals. In two previous meetings, Rune had never lost to Sinner, so this was far from a lock. In fact, many pundits, myself included, questioned as to if Sinner (who had already qualified for the SemiFinal) would intentionally lose as to have the most dangerous player in the event eliminated. With the home crowd behind him, Sinner played an exceptional match and saved 2 virtual match points at 4-All in the 3rd set, and promptly broke back to win 6-4. As a result, Djokovic qualified for the Semi's and from that point forward, NEVER LOOKED BACK as he obliterated both Alcaraz in the Semi's and Sinner in the Finals.
Crazily enough, most of the talk for the week didn't centre around the Year End #1, instead it was about the home town fave, Jannik Sinner. Since the US Open, Jannik has played some truly incredible tennis - he won two 500 level events (with incredible fields) in Beijing and Vienna, and his only loss was at the Shanghai Masters to Ben Shelton in a 3rd set tiebreak. Personally I think he wins the YEC this past week, if he allows himself to lose to Rune in his final RR match. The question going forward for Jannik is can this level continue next year? There are many players that have had incredible indoor hardcourt runs to end the season that were unable to follow it up the next year, so its a legit question.
Coming into the week, Hamad Medjedovic had neither won an ATP Tour Level event nor had he reached the top 100 in the ATP Rankings, but that didn't mean that he wasn't incredibly talented. He won 3 Challenger level events earlier this year and reached the Semi's in both a clay (Gstaad) and hard court (Astana). Then again with all that being said, he might be best known as a player that Djokovic has taken under his wing, as Djokovic has not only served as a mentor but has been footing the bill for his training over the past couple of years. Medjedovic stepped into the spotlight this week though in the NextGen Finals as he showed off some massive serving, and some absolutely massive ground strokes. One of his returns of serve was soo ridiculous that when it landed in, you could see the Umpire laughing as it glanced off the corner baseline. He won the NextGen Finals without losing a match, and did so by only losing a single set that wasnt decided by a tiebreak. Medjedovic earned more money this week ($500,000+) than he had in his entire career. Safe bet that this won't be the last time that you hear his name going forward.
In terms of FTL, the final GameWeek of the season tends to be a bit complicated for most involved, and this year was even tougher as the Next Gen Finals field wasn't set, nor had many of the players even confirmed entry before the start of the GW lockout. The only helpful thing was that both Shelton and Musetti had confirmed that they had withdrawn, so managers weren't left holding the bag with them in the lineup.
A massive kuddos goes out to Soklian (RafaSquad) for her 2nd victory of the season. Safe to say that she's more excited that Rafa Nadal will be ready to play in Brisbane to start next year than she is about her victory tho lol. She accumulated an incredible 584.5 points for the week as she had both the winner and finalist in both events this week!. She had Djoker as her Captain, Sinner as her KP, and Fils and Medjedovic as a TP.
Augusto (GOATic's) finished in 2nd just 4.2 points behind our winner. Sadly, his decision to make Sinner his Captain ended up biting him in the ass. If Sinner loses to Rune in the final RR match, does Augusto end up winning the week? hmmm, I think the answer is most likely!
Vlad Jovanovski (Strongest Avenger) finished just 8 points behind our winner. Sadly, once Musetti decided to withdraw his hopes were basically dashed, as he ended up having to play the GW with only 7 players.
