Djokovic gains free pass to Wimbledon semis after de Minaur pulls out

By Leobert Julian A. de la Peña

Novak Djokovic didn’t even need to break a sweat to punch a semifinal ticket in the Wimbledon tournament following the withdrawal of his opponent, Alex de Minaur.

De Minaur, who is currently having a terrific campaign in the most prestigious grass surface tournament in the world, pulled out of his quarterfinal clash with Djokovic due to a hip injury.

After his Round of 16 win against Arthur Fils, de Minaur announced that he suffered a little tear in the fiber cartilage of his hip.

Due to the injury, de Minaur immediately released his withdrawal statement, adding that he will need more time to heal as the fiber cartilage is at the end of his hip adductor.

During the last game set of his match against Fils, de Minaur shared that he heard a loud crack in his hip but decided to finish the game and seal the four-set victory.

Now that de Minaur is out of the main draw, Djokovic will be focusing on his next assignment against Lorenzo Musetti in the semifinal round.

Musetti is fresh off a come-from-behind win over Taylor Fritz- 3.6, 7.6, 6.2, 3.6, 6.1- and is looking to sustain his momentum against the Serbian superstar.

However, Musetti will be facing a laser-focused Djokovic who only managed to drop two game sets out of his four victories.

Djokovic kicked off his Wimbledon campaign with a lopsided sweeping win over Vit Kopriva and followed it up with a second-round dub against Jacob Fearnley.

In the third round, Djokovic maintained his pace to dispose Alexie Popyrin and replicated his great performance in the following match against Holger Rune.

He was supposed to arrange a highly-anticipated quarterfinal duel with de Minaur but the recent turn of events paved the way for the walkover win.