Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
BEATEN IN STRAIGHT SPECS
New injury crisis for Djokovic as he gets the elbow from short-sighted Korean Chung
NOVAK DJOKOVIC faces another long injury layoff after his painful defeat by young gun Hyeon Chung at the Australian Open.
The unseeded 21-year-old, who wears large white-rimmed glasses on court, struck a blow for the next generation by beating his “idol” to become the first Korean to reach a Grand Slam quarter-final.
The world No.58 faces American world No.97 Tennys Sandgren in a shock last-eight clash.
But the immediate future for sixtime champion Djokovic, 30, is less certain. The Serb had not played since pulling out of Wimbledon with his elbow injury and used a compression sleeve on his arm in Melbourne along with a new service action.
But he needed treatment in the first set and, despite fighting back in each set, went down 7-6 7-5 7-6. The world No.14 said: “Unfortunately, it’s not great. Kind of end of the first set it started hurting more. So I had to deal with it till the end of the match.
“I was hoping to get through it. As a professional athlete, you have to deal with pain at a certain level, a certain degree. You kind of get used to that. I felt the level of pain was not that high that I need to stop the match – even though it was obviously compromising my serve.
“Do I need more time out to allow it to heal again?
“Now I don’t know. I have to reassess everything with my team, medical team, coaches and everybody, scan it, see what the situation is like. Let’s see what’s happening inside.”
“I don’t want to talk about my injury tonight because then I’m taking away Chung’s victory, the credit that he deserves.”
Chung beat Djokovic at his own game with his brilliant movement and powerful hitting.
Jamie Murray tweeted: “That was the most Novak-esque performance I’ve seen – and it was by Chung!! Truly incredible performance. Wow.”
The bespectacled Chung said: “I’m trying to copy Novak because he’s my idol. Today my dream’s come true.”
Sangren followed victory over Stan Wawrinka by beating No.5 seed Dominic Thiem in his first Grand Slam. Defending champion Roger Federer will face No.19 seed Tomas Berdych in his 14th Aussie Open quarter-final. Angelique Kerber, the only Grand Slam winner left in the women’s tournament, fought back to beat Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-wei to set up a clash with US Open finalist Madison Keys.