Featured Image Credit: Eurosport
Topics: Tennis, Wimbledon, Olympics, Novak Djokovic
Alex Brotherton
Carlos Alcaraz broke down in tears during a TV interview after the men's tennis singles gold medal match at the Paris Olympics.
World No.1 Novak Djokovic beat Alcaraz 7-6 (7-3) 7-6 (7-2) to win a long-awaited gold medal at the Olympic Games and complete a career 'Golden Slam'.
The 37-year-old is just the fifth player in history to win all four majors plus the Olympic title, following in the footsteps of Steffi Graf, Andre Agassi, Rafa Nadal and Serena Williams.
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Djokovic - the oldest tennis Olympic gold medalist since 1988 - took revenge on Alcaraz after the young Spaniard beat him in the Wimbledon final last month.
The 21-year-old won both Wimbledon and the French Open this year, but he was devastated to miss out on the gold medal at Roland Garros.
Alcaraz had to stop his on-court interview with Alex Corretja following the match as he was unable to get his words out while crying.
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Corretja consoled the young star and put his arm around his fellow Spaniard, before giving Alcaraz a few minutes to compose himself before resuming the interview.
"I gave everything," Alcaraz said.
"It’s painful to lose the way I lost this match. I had my chances to probably be up in the match. I couldn’t take it. Novak [Djokovic] was playing great. He deserves this. In the tough moments he increased his level.
"He played unbelievable shots... an unbelievable game. I’m a bit disappointed but honestly I’ll leave the court with my head really really high. Fighting for Spain was everything to me. I’m proud with the way I played today."
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Djokovic broke down down in tears of joy after hitting the winning shot, sitting with his head in his hands courtside before heading over to celebrate with his family and support team.
The sell-out crowd at Roland Garros was treated to a thrilling contest in which Djokovic saved eight break points to win the first set tie-break before taking the second set tie-break too.