After 24 years, a top 10 without Federer, Nadal or Djokovic

Novak Djokovic lost in the first round of the US Open on Sunday night, beaten 7-6 (5), 5-7, 4-6, 6-2, 6-1 by Mariano Navone in four hours and 36 minutes. When the rankings are updated on 14 September he will fall out of the top 10, and for the first time since October 2002 the list will contain none of Djokovic, Roger Federer or Rafael Nadal. The streak outlasted two of the three careers that built it. It ended with the third unable to keep food down in the New York heat.

The match

Navone, a 25-year-old Argentine ranked 49th, had never beaten a top-10 player at a major, and for three sets there was little sign he would. Djokovic led 3-0 in the opener before losing the tiebreak, then took the second and third sets and went a break up at 2-1 in the fourth. He won one more game.

Sky Sports, reporting from Flushing Meadows, timed the match at 4 hours 36 minutes, the longest first-round match of Djokovic's Grand Slam career, and describes him vomiting by the towel box late in the second set, again in the third and again at the start of the fourth, then cramping in the fifth until he could barely move. He made 70 unforced errors. It was the second such episode in two weeks: in Cincinnati he had lost to Thiago Tirante while being sick into a towel, and afterwards mentioned a health problem he said he had carried for years and which flares in heat and humidity.

"I didn't enjoy myself," he said. "Vomiting, throwing up, a serious issue there. Then my whole body started to collapse, basically cramping and pain." Asked whether the problem could be resolved: "Can the issue be fixed? I don't know. I'm trying, man. I'm trying. Let's see."

It was Djokovic's first first-round defeat at the US Open and his earliest exit at any major since the 2006 Australian Open, when Paul Goldstein beat him. Between those two losses he won 78 consecutive first-round matches at Grand Slam tournaments. It was also the first major since the 2003 French Open whose second round contained none of Djokovic, Federer or Nadal.

Navone recorded his first win over a top-10 player at a major. "It was very tough for me because you are playing with the 'GOAT' on this court," he said.

The tournament has moved on without him. Carlos Alcaraz, the defending champion, reached the quarterfinals on Sunday in his first tournament since a wrist injury in April.

The arithmetic

A ranking is a rolling 52-week total. Each week, the points a player earned at the same event a year earlier drop off and are replaced by this year's result. In the official ranking dated 31 August, which stays in force until the tournament ends, Djokovic is No. 5 with 3,770 points, of which 800 came from last year's semifinal. A first-round loss at a major is worth 10. His post-tournament total is 2,980.

Every player in the table is also losing last year's points and adding this year's, so the final order depends on results still to be played. The direction is not in doubt. TNT Sports projects Djokovic at No. 11 when the new list appears on Monday 14 September, possibly lower depending on the players beneath him. The projection is TNT's; the official list on 14 September is what counts.

Why October 2002

TNT Sports traced the last top 10 without any of the three to the ranking of 7 October 2002: Hewitt, Haas, Agassi, Safin, Henman, Ferrero, Costa, Grosjean, Moya, Kafelnikov. Federer entered that month and stayed until November 2016. Nadal arrived in April 2005, aged 18, and remained for 912 consecutive weeks until March 2023. Djokovic first entered in March 2007, and his only absence since, from November 2017 to July 2018 through injury, came while Federer and Nadal were both still there.

Three careers, each with its own gaps, and the gaps never coincided. Federer retired after the 2022 Laver Cup and Nadal after the 2024 season. For the past two seasons the streak has depended on Djokovic alone.

What it does and does not mean

A ranking measures the last twelve months, not a player's current level, and in Djokovic's case the two have come apart. His 2026 season includes the Australian Open final in January, where he beat Jannik Sinner in a five-set semifinal before losing to Carlos Alcaraz, and a Wimbledon semifinal in July, again against Sinner. Most of the current top 10 would take that season.

The same page records seven withdrawals from scheduled events and a match record of 14 wins and 7 losses. That is what the ranking is reflecting: a player who still beats good opponents when he plays, but who is rarely available and who, in the two most recent hard-court events, could not physically finish. Sky Sports raised the question of whether this was his last Grand Slam match. Djokovic did not say so, and nothing in his comments pointed to a decision about the rest of the season.

The top 10 will change on 14 September in a way it has not since 2002. What Djokovic does next is a separate question, and he has said he does not know the answer.