Novak Djokovic looked in trouble. After losing the first set to Carlos Alcaraz in their blockbuster Australian Open quarterfinal, he shook his head at his box.

He appeared to have picked up an upper-thigh injury that was significantly restricting his movement. And Alcaraz had the momentum.

Yet as the match went on, Djokovic’s injury turned out to be a bigger problem for the young Spaniard, who was thrown by how to best handle it. Particularly after the Serbian took a medical timeout off the court to get his left thigh strapped and take some painkillers, and then came back firing.

Alcaraz had his momentum squandered by the timeout — similar to Holger Rune in his fourth-round match with world number one Jannik Sinner the day before.

The 21-year-old four-time grand slam champion said he felt like he was controlling the match, after he had just won the first set 6-4. Then after the timeout, he started to second guess shots and was more hesitant than usual, which let Djokovic back into the match.

Seven-time major singles champion turned commentator John McEnroe said on ESPN: “This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this routine (from Djokovic). Don’t be fooled.”

Then when his co-commentator and brother Patrick McEnroe asked, “Did you see this coming?”, John replied, “Yes”.

When asked if he noticed that Alcaraz lost his focus after the injury, Djokovic said: “I did.”

“Look, I feel for him. I understand that it’s not comfortable to play someone that you don’t know if he’s going to retire or not. Is he moving? Is he running? What’s happening? I felt that he was looking at me more than he was looking at himself,” Djokovic said.

Still in the tournament, Djokovic didn’t want to give much away but said it was a very similar hamstring problem to what he had in 2023 (described as a three-centimetre tear) which restricted his movement.

Djokovic said post-match on court he would have considered retiring if he had lost the second set, but the momentum had started to shift his way after the timeout. Everyone knew it, especially Alcaraz.

“I think everybody saw in the second set he was struggling a little bit to move. I don’t know if it was more running to the forehand or running to backhand, but obviously he was struggling. Then the third and fourth set, I didn’t see anything bad from him,” Alcaraz said.

“So I’m not saying, like, he made a show. I’m just saying that, I don’t know. It’s obvious and everybody saw it, that he’s struggling in the second set. Then the third and fourth set he showed he was really good.”

With experience on his side, Djokovic used this to his advantage and tried to capitalise on Alcaraz’s hesitation, particularly during rallies.

“He was trying to play at some point quite a few drop shots and make me run,” Djokovic said.

“I’ve been in situations, as well, where opponent’s struggling with injury, but keep going. The opponent is going for everything, and then he’s staying in the match. Then all of a sudden as the match progresses, the opponent feels better. You’re starting to panic a bit with your game.”

‘Not the worst timing from his side’

Similarly, the day before, 13th seed Rune looked close to causing an upset against world number one Sinner when the Italian was showing clear signs of being in physical distress on court.

Sinner was seen trembling during a break between games and said post-match there were times he felt dizzy. He finally called for a medical timeout during the third set, where he was taken off court to be assessed by a doctor for close to 12 minutes.

Rune, meanwhile, was forced to wait on Rod Laver Arena on a day that reached 33 degrees Celsius. The Dane had just won the second set 6-3 and felt he had the momentum, which was broken by the lengthy break.

“Obviously it’s perfectly fine that you check. It was a very warm day, even though there was not sun the whole time. It was very humid, so I was also feeling it,” Rune said.

“It’s fair that he got checked. I think it took longer than I expected. It was around 10 minutes, maybe even more. So that was a bit brutal in the middle of the set … I just couldn’t move on. I had good momentum in this moment.

“It was not the worst timing from his side.”