The spectators at Melbourne got an opportunity to view the longest ever grand slam finals played between World No.1 Novak Djokovic of Serbia and World No.2 Rafael Nadal of Spain on 29th January 2012 which lasted for about 5 hours and 53 minutes and finally Novak Djokovic emerged as winner in a marathon encounter. It all started at around 7:30 PM before 15,000 strong and vociferous crowd where both emerged out of the enclave and started their warm up. Soon the spectacular game of tennis started and the game was evenly poised. Nadal won the first set 7-5 and it contained some great volleys and rallies. Djokovic went on to win second set 6-4 and continued to win third set as well for 6-2.
Down with two sets to one, Nadal bounced back strongly bagging the fourth set 7-6 (7-5) via tie-breaker. At the end of fourth set itself both the players were almost tired and they started fifth set. In between the sets Novak Djokovic was changing his shirt from black to white and again to black. There were lot of rallies, down the line passing shots, high lobs, volleys and aces during the marathon five set encounter and in between Djokovic finished with 57 winners, along with 69 unforced errors and Nadal had 44 winners against 71 unforced errors.
In between rain also intervened and play was stopped for some time by pulling the stadium roof to cover. This match had already long surpassed Mats Wilander win over Ivan Lendl at the 1988 U S Open, which lasted for 4 hours and 54 minutes, as the longest final in the terms of duration. Finally, the epic match got over when Djokovic won the fifth set 7-5 at 1:37 AM, the next day, Monday and post the match as the players waited for the trophy presentation, Nadal leaned on the net, while Djokovic sat on his haunches. Eventually, a nearby official took pity and they were given chairs and bottles of water.
The final scores are Novak Djokovic defeated Rafael Nadal 5–7, 6–4, 6–2, 6–7(5–7), 7–5 in this epic encounter and one of the most memorable grand slam finals the game of tennis has ever witnessed.
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