“I felt his level dropped”: Dino Prizmic, 20, on reading the moment against his idol Novak Djokovic
Dino Prizmic beat Novak Djokovic 2-6, 6-2, 6-4 on his Foro Italico debut on Saturday. The 20-year-old Croatian’s account of the match was about something quieter than emotion, recognising, in real time, that the door had opened.
Dino Prizmic, Rome 2026 | © Foto FITP
Dino Prizmic walked onto Campo Centrale on Saturday afternoon to play the man whose tennis he had grown up watching, and whom he had faced once before. He lost to Djokovic in the first round of the 2024 Australian Open in his Grand Slam main-draw debut. Two hours and change later, the 20-year-old Croatian, a former junior world No. 8 now ranked a career-high 79th, walked off Campo Centrale as the player who had beaten him. The score was 2-6, 6-2, 6-4. The biggest win of his career.
In the press conference that followed, Prizmic was calm, almost matter-of-fact, in a way 20-year-olds are not supposed to be after taking out a 24-time Grand Slam champion. He answered the obvious questions in the obvious way. “It was a big moment for me. It was also a big thing to share the court with a legend.” But the more interesting answer came when he was asked, simply, how the match had turned.
“At the end of the first set, I felt his level dropped a little bit,” Prizmic said. “At the beginning of the second set, I was up 2-0. I thought: now I can play against him.”
Prizmic : Djokovic “unbelievable” in the first set
Djokovic had taken the first set 6-2, playing what Prizmic himself called “unbelievable” tennis. Most 20-year-olds in that situation start counting down the games left in their afternoon. Prizmic noticed something else: a half-step late, a service game that didn’t quite snap shut, a body that was no longer producing what the first set had produced. He registered it, broke serve to start the second, and decided the match was now winnable.
The Croatian took the second 6-2 and the third 6-4, both behind a forehand that Djokovic himself would single out at the net. “I told him at the net that his forehand improved a lot. Whatever he has been doing with his team is working out well,” Djokovic said in his own press conference.
Prizmic, asked about the same shot, agreed without overplaying it. “Today I felt my forehand unbelievable. I played as much as I can with my forehand on the court. It was very important.”
“Now he didn’t play for a while, so it was easier,” he said of facing Djokovic this time, compared to their previous meeting at the 2024 Australian Open. “But again, it was for me very hard. Especially the first set, he played unbelievable. I just tried to stay in the match and stay focused. In the end, it was good.”
Prizmic’s recent results back the self-assessment. A former world junior No. 8, the Croatian broke into the world’s top 200 in August 2023 and only crossed into the top 100 last month, in April 2026. The breakthrough came at the Madrid Masters 1000 three weeks ago, where he beat former finalist Matteo Berrettini and the world No. 6 Ben Shelton to reach the third round and lift his ranking to a career-high No. 79. He arrived in Rome at 8-6 for the season, having served notice he could compete with players in the top ten. The match against Djokovic was the next data point.
“I played a couple of matches on the ATP Tour now, lots of matches in a row. I feel very confident on court.”
Asked what had changed, Prizmic reached for a small, modest answer that was probably the right one.
“I played a couple of matches on the ATP Tour now, so maybe this level. I played lots of matches in a row. I feel very confident on court.”
He has also, by his own account in earlier interviews, prepared more carefully and recovered better than he used to. The Friday performance was not a shock to anyone who has been paying attention. The opponent was. The stage — Foro Italico, a partisan crowd, a sentimental favourite across the net — was. The player Prizmic was on the day was not.
Asked if he had ever imagined, watching Djokovic on television as a kid, that he would beat him at a tournament this important, Prizmic gave the cleanest answer of the press conference.
“Not really, to be honest. Not really. But today it happened.”
He has Saturday off. On Monday he plays his second-round opponent – the winner of a match still to be decided – with the same calendar as everyone else and the same job in front of him. He has been at pains, all afternoon, to make clear that he understands this. “I have another match in two days, so I just need to recover as much as I can and play my best tennis.” That is the answer of a player who already thinks like a professional. Djokovic, who praised Prizmic’s forehand at the net, would recognise the mindset just as easily.
