Fourth seed Novak Djokovic continues his run of form in Kazakhstan, cruising past World No. 34 Botic van De Zandschulp 6-3, 6-1 in one hour and 11 minutes.
In his on-court interview, the Belgrade native stressed: “I think my serve worked very well when I needed to get out of the trouble in the first set particularly.”
“There were some 30/30 games, and when I broke his serve for 4-2, I faced a break point, and I came in, and he had a look at that passing shot, and he missed it. The match is decided at these moments. [Between] 5-2 or 4-3 up, there is a big difference, and I served well to end the first set.”
In addition, he outlined: “[In the] second set, I think I started to read his serve better and just started swinging through the court more. Botic is a quality tennis player. When he has time, he can hurt you, so I tried to take away that time from him, and I’m very pleased with the way I played, particularly in the second.”
The 21-time Grand Slam champion has shown no signs of a lack of match fitness, but instead, he has consistently improved his game, raising his level within each event, playing as if he has never been gone.
The match against the Dutchman challenged the World No. 7 but did not stop him from advancing into the last eight at the ATP 500, winning 80 percent of his first-serve points to his adversary only 57 percent.
Moreover, he converted four of five breakpoint opportunities while the 27-year-old failed to turn around both chances he had to break Djokovic’s serve, one in each set.
The 89-time ATP titlist did not commit a double fault and fired five aces en route to nail his sixth victory in a row.
Next, the Serbian will meet US Open semifinalist Karen Khachanov, who ousted Tel Aviv Open runner-up Marin Cilic, 2-6, 6-3, 6-3, for a place in the semifinals on Friday.
The 35-year-old leads their series 6-1; they last faced one another at the Belgrade Open semifinals this season, where the former defeated the World No. 18 in three sets.
Djokovic arrived in Astana fresh from a nearly flawless week in Tel Aviv, which saw him earning his 89th career title on Tour without dropping a set all week in Israel.
The Tel Aviv Open was the first tournament at tour level he contested after winning his seventh title at Wimbledon in July. In between, he played the Laver Cup representing Team Europe last month.