Novak Djokovic given a bleak verdict in his final Grand Slam dream by former top 10 star

Kevin Palmer 18 Jan 2026 8:00 PM

Barbara Schett talks to Tennis365 about Novak Djokovic

Novak Djokovic is back in Melbourne to compete in the Australian Open for a remarkable 21st time, but former world No 7 Barbara Schett has suggested the chances the Serbian achieving his dream of winning a 25th Grand Slam title may be over.

At the age of 38, Djokovic is striving to win an 11th Australian Open title, but he has not played a competitive match since early November and heads into a new year with fresh question marks over how long he will continue to perform at the highest level.

Djokovic has hinted he would like to finish his career playing for Serbia at the 2028 Olympics, but that feels like a long shot for a player who admits he is struggling to compete against the dominant duo of Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner at the top of the men’s game.

And when Schett sums up why Djokovic continues to compete at an age when most players have given up, she struggles to come up with credible answers.

“He just loves it so much,” Schett told Tennis365. “If he wants to keep going, I love it because it gives us something to talk about.

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“What he achieved last year, reaching the semi-final at every Grand Slam is unbelievable at his age.

“I’m just worried that he has not played much after pulling out of Adelaide, how he is going to perform now.

“He beat Alcaraz here last year and then had to pull out against Zverev and that’s the problem. The body will always let him down.

“To win a Grand Slam title? Never say no with someone who has won 24 times, but the chances are not that good.

“He says he wants to play the Olympics again, that’s how long he wants to play. Eventually, he will have to retire. They will have to carry him off the court.

“I don’t know what he is thinking. It’s incredible how long his career has been and he still has the drive and passion to practice and go through the off-season. It’s incredible.

“I’m not expecting him to reach another semi-finals and if he does, I will take my hat off to him. Everything he does not is just the icing on the cake.”

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Former world No 2 Alex Corretja also spoke to Tennis365 about Djokovic’s hopes, as he offered a more upbeat verdict for the Serbian.

“You never know what is going to happen in tennis and in life in general,” Corretja told Tennis365.

“Let’s say one of them loses in the quarter-finals and he beats one of them in the semis. Then you are in the final with another player and if it is [Alexander] Zverev, that is also a tough task.

“It is more about how he is feeling when he gets into the main matches of the quarter-finals and the semis like last year at Wimbledon when, in my opinion, he was toast before he played Sinner.

“Or is it like the US Open when it looked like he was okay, but they he couldn’t manage to do well against Carlitos.

“Not playing the week before is difficult because all the matches come at you and you don’t know how the body will react. Physically and mentally, sometimes it is exhausting, so we will see.

“Hopefully he can be there. It would be great to have Novak there again playing for even more history. That would be awesome for tennis.”