Novak Djokovic joins Carlos Alcaraz at prestigious year-end tournament

Shahida Jacobs 19 Aug 2023 4:16 PM

Novak Djokovic wins the ATP Finals

Novak Djokovic has booked his place in the season-ending ATP Finals following his run to the semi-final of the Cincinnati Open.

The 23-time Grand Slam winner has joined Carlos Alcaraz in the line-up for the 2023 tournament that will once again take place at the Pala Alpitour in Turin with six other spots still to be confirmed.

Djokovic’s place in the ATP Finals comes on the back of yet another brilliant year as he has already won three titles this year – including the Australian Open and French Open – and also finished runner-up to Alcaraz at Wimbledon.

The Serbian will make his 16th appearance at the prestigious event and he has failed to qualify for the tournament only once – in 2017 – since he made his debut back in 2007.

Djokovic drew level with Roger Federer’s record six ATP Finals titles last year. He went undefeated during the round-robin phase before beating Taylor Fritz in the semi-final and Casper Ruud in the final to take his record to 46-17.

Last year he also became the oldest champion as he was 35 years and five months when he won the title and he will break his own record if he is once again the last man standing in Italy.

Novak Djokovic’s ATP Finals record

2007 – round-robin
2008 – champion
2009 – round-robin
2010 – semi-final
2011 – round-robin
2012 – champion
2013 – champion
2014 – champion
2015 – champion
2016 – runner-up
2018 – runner-up
2019 – round-robin
2020 – semi-final
2021 – semi-final
2022 – champion

Although Alcaraz currently occupies the top seed for the ATP Finals, Djokovic can still usurp him as the Spaniard is defending 2,000 points at the US Open while the Serbian has no points to defend.

Furthermore, there will also be 1,000 points on offer at the Shanghai Masters, which returns to the calendar after a three-year absence. Djokovic, though, does have 600 points to defend at the Paris Masters as he finished runner-up to Holger Rune last year while Alcaraz lost in the quarter-final.

Rest of the ATP Race for Turn

World No 3 Daniil Medvedev looks set to be the next player to qualify for the ATP Finals as he is currently third in the Race for Turin with 5,390 points.

He is followed by Jannik Sinner (4,185), Stefanos Tsitsipas (3,525), Andrey Rublev (3,280), Holger Rune (3,045) and Alexander Zverev (2,670), but there are still a lot of points up for grabs in the next few months with the US Open and two ATP Masters 1000 events still on the schedule.

Taylor Fritz (2,650), Casper Ruud (2,580), Alex de Minaur (2,325), Tommy Paul (2,255), Karen Khachanov (1,900) and Frances Tiafoe (1,850) are also still in hot pursuit of top-eight finishes.