Novak Djokovic and How He Almost Lost His Australian Open Title

Following the draw for the 2012 Australian Open tournament, all the usual excited talk of potential matchups and predictions for future matches ensued.

Novak Djokovic and Andy Murray were on the same side of the draw and Rafael Nadal would have to get through three of the toughest serves on tour to make the final—John Isner, Tomas Berdych and Roger Federer.

For many, world number one Djokovic facing off against world number two Nadal in the final of the 2012 Australian Open was not at all a shock pretournament prediction.

I mean, a final between these two is becoming a bit of a norm these days.

We weren't disappointed, either. The five-set, five-hour, marathon of a match that followed will go down as one of the greatest Open matches of all time, with Djokovic emerging as champion.

For Rafa, it was bitter disappointment at the hands of the Serb again. For Novak, it was simply relief and reward for all the sacrifice.

After all the Twitter and Facebook hype had died down, and after one innocuous conversation with a friend, it finally dawned that Novak almost lost the title before he'd even played the final.

The person he almost lost it to?

Tournament organizers.

Think about it for a minute—out of all the players that compete in a tournament, who should the schedule favor the most?

The world number one, because, well, he's the world number one.

How then was it that Djokovic had such limited turnaround between his epic encounter with Andy Murray, while world number two Nadal had two full days to put his feet up and rest easy after his win over Federer?

How did the tournament organizers miss such a blatant scheduling error that very nearly cost the world number one his chance to win a Grand Slam event?

Fortunately for the organizers, for Djokovic and for tennis fans around the world, the Serbian maestro was still brilliant enough to grind out a win, despite his limited preparation.

As he was already struggling with injuries, the world number one proved his determination, perseverance and pure heart as he took out the opening Grand Slam of the year.

However, he should never have had to do it in that fashion.

Either both semifinals should have been held on Day 12 of the tournament—giving both players equal recovery and preparation time—or Nadal should have played the second semifinal as Djokovic is the world number one.

It's not special treatment, it's simply just scheduling the tournament the way it should have been scheduled so that Djokovic had the equal amount of preparation as Nadal at the very least.

His victory in the Open truly was one that overcame all the odds—injury, breathing problems, lack of preparation—even if he was the favorite for the entire tournament.

What's more, I'm sure that somewhere in the world, wherever he is, Novak Djokovic is sleeping very, very well right now because of it.

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