Defending Wimbledon champion and No. 1 seed Jannik Sinner was saved by his serve from a valiant upset bid by Serbian Miomir Kecmanovic, winning his first five-set match in the tournament on Monday in London.
Meanwhile, Novak Djokovic closed down the court just before the 11 p.m. local time curfew, the Serbian star prevailing over China’s Wu Yibing in four sets, 6-4, 5-7, 6-5, 6-5.
“He definitely surprised me with every level of every shot he had in his game. At some point it looked like he really didn’t have a weakness,” Djokovic said. “Look, playing on this surface, this kind of match is decided on a few points.”
Wu converted only one of 11 break points in the match.
Djokovic, the seventh seed in the men’s draw, moved to 21-0 in first-round matches at Wimbledon and worked through back discomfort and fatigue. But the 39-year-old said the back issue was more age than injury. The seven-time Wimbledon champ now has 103 wins at the All England Club.
Sinner’s 31 aces helped him to overcome 51 unforced errors during the 4-6, 6-3, 6-7 (6), 6-2, 6-3 victory, a thrilling three-hour and 30-minute marathon.
“I was a little tight in the beginning, didn’t play my very best,” the Italian star said after the first-round scare. “That third set was a very tough one to swallow. But I turned it around. Very happy.”
Sinner led the third-set tiebreak 3-2 when Kecmanovic attacked a return and blew a backhand past him to erase a 3-0 deficit. But he lost patience on one of the longest volleys of the match and slugged the ball multiple feet out of bounds with Sinner standing near the back line.
Unbowed, Kecmanovic came up with an equalizer to claim the next point on a powerful forehand near the same spot, then sliced in another to Sinner’s left to jump ahead 5-4 in the tiebreak. Sinner picked up back-to-back points with a hard forehand and his 20th ace of the match before Centre Court erupted on a point that brought both players to the net to shake hands.
Sinner left his feet to make a save down the line to his right and Kecmanovic smashed the ball to the opposite corner. Sinner somehow found a way to send it back but could only watch as Kecmanovic put away the point.
Down 7-6, Sinner served but dropped the tiebreak with his 43rd unforced error of the match to end a third set that ran more than one hour.
Bouncing back, Sinner broke Kecmanovic’s serve for the second time in the match and began to exhibit more emotion and confidence. He worked for a 4-2 lead in the fourth and recovered from a backhand miss to rip consecutive aces for a 5-2 advantage. At 40-all, Kecmanovic hit a return into the net and lost the next point to give Sinner more momentum and the serve to open the fifth set.
Sinner was playing his first match since a shocking second-round loss at the French Open.
“It was a very, very different feeling,” Sinner said of opening on Centre Court as the defending men’s champion. “Coming back here as defending champion means a lot to me. I felt the first couple of sets, a lot of mistakes. Trying to accept that. Third set was very tough, very great points from his side. This is tennis. Every day is different.”
Another marathon was taking place on Court 2 in a high-drama five-setter that stretched to a 10-point tiebreak between American Michael Zheng and Great Britain’s Cameron Norrie, the 26th seed. Zheng prevailed 6-7 (7), 6-2, 6-7 (2), 6-3, 7-6 (4) in the nearly four-hour match to reach the second round of the grass-court Grand Slam for the first time in his career.
As Zheng moved on, Sinner and Kecmanovic were battling in their fifth set.
Sinner endured physical and mental tests on Monday. He fell hard on his hip early in the match and left the court after winning the second set but returned without calling for a medical timeout. There was also blood visible on Sinner’s bright white shoe, although the malady had no negative impact on his serve as he set a career high for aces in a major tournament.
Sinner beat Carlos Alcaraz for the men’s singles title in 2025 and played in just one tiebreak the entire tournament.
Russian qualifier Roman Safiullin knocked out 12th-seeded countryman Andrey Rublev 6-4, 6-7 (6), 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (12) in a match just shy of four hours long. Each player saved two match points during the marathon fifth-set tiebreaker.
Poland’s Hubert Hurkacz defeated Norway’s Casper Ruud 6-4, 6-2, 7-6 (7) to send the No. 11 seed packing. Ethan Quinn upset Italian 14th seed Luciano Darderi 7-6 (7), 7-5, 6-2.
No. 3 seed Felix Auger-Aliassime of Canada breezed past Kazakhstan’s Aleksandr Shevchenko 6-3, 6-1, 6-4. Other seeded players to advance included No. 8 Daniil Medvedev of Russia, No. 16 Learner Tien, No. 21 Tommy Paul, No. 22 Alejandro Davidovich Fokina of Spain, his countryman and No. 23 seed Rafael Jodar, No. 24 Joao Fonseca of Brazil, No. 25 Arthur Rinderknech of France and No. 31 Ignacio Buse of Peru.
–Field Level Media
