What is going on in Novak Djokovic's head?

Video Clips: First set | Second set

What would Novak Djokovic's game look like if somehow all of the pressure was relieved from his shoulders? I've been closely observing Djokovic's body language lately, in particular in his third round against Jeremy Chardy, and to me, it looks like much of the tennis that Djokovic has been showing has a lot to do with nervous tension. The kind of nervous tension that doesn't allow you to swing at the ball freely, to take a big cut at the ball without thinking about whether it will make its target or not. And Djokovic does take big cuts at the ball, especially on the forehand. It could just as much be interpreted as lack of confidence, and that's part of the story as well.

Watching how Djokovic reacts to his own shots, it looks like he's consistently irritated at himself, setting overly high standards for himself. Perhaps he needs to take a step back and think more about how he wants to play the match, rather than the outcome or result of the match. To somehow find a relaxed state of mind so he can rediscover the free swinging nature that he used to have on his forehand.

Against Chardy, Djokovic's groundstrokes looked inhibited and mechanical, lacking in pace particularly on the forehand side. At least on the backhand side, he can still use his left wrist for that extra sense of control, and he does have good feel on that side. It was a very deliberate way of playing, hitting controlled loopy shots trying to guide the ball to where he wanted them to land. Yet he still couldn't really string together his shots that well, that's what a lack of confidence does. He won't be winning any big matches playing like this, but it could be a completely different situation if he takes the mindset of being the underdog.

This match was a test of Djokovic's patience because he was clearly playing the better tennis of the two, yet it wasn't showing on the scoreboard because of his inability to play the bigger points. Watching the match, I really didn't know how Djokovic hadn't yet managed to score a break in the first set, when Chardy must have gifted him about three free points in each of his first three service games.

Chardy is one of the more inconsistent players on the tour, although he does have weapons to make up for it, particularly on the serve and forehand. Generally if Chardy serves well, he plays well. That's the barometer of his game, because then that takes the pressure off the rest of his game, and he can afford to make a couple of mistakes here and there. His serve wasn't working great here, but it was working well enough to dig himself out of holes, and to hang in his own service games.

Chardy's game reminds me of a less effective version of Jo-Wilfried Tsonga's. Like Tsonga, Chardy looks like a completely different player when he leans in on his shots and looks to move forward into his shots. He likes to control the centre of the court and he's quick to step in and take the ball on the rise, which is particularly useful given the extreme grip he has on his forehand to make it easier for himself. He covers the court with long strides, and he has a large wingspan which makes him an intimidating presence at the net if he chooses to make it up there.

Out of all the players, Chardy probably has some of the most unorthodox techniques in the game, so inevitably there's a big chance of his game breaking down. His forehand is both his big weapon and his achilles heel at the same time. He uses a big backswing, and he basically takes a swipe at the ball in a similar way that Robin Soderling does except that he uses a far more side-on stance than Soderling. It's the opposite of having a fluid stroke and it must be particularly difficult trying to manage when there are so many things going on at the same time.

His forehand is an attacking shot, there's not much of a happy medium. It's a flat stroke, with not much topspin particularly under pressure. I find that he gets more height over the net and better topspin when he's energetic and launching into the shot almost like he's jumping on it, but that doesn't seem to happen when he's tight. He's one of those players that need to play aggressive tennis to do well, and that makes his decision-making a whole lot easier. He doesn't really have a whole lot of attacking options on the backhand, so essentially he puts a lot of pressure on his forehand to do most of the work in his matches.

The forehand doesn't need to function consistently. It just needs to hold up and his main aim is to hope that he can string together some big shots on one of his returning games, most likely with the aid of some second serves because he doesn't return big serves that well. I thought Chardy should have returned Robredo's serve better than he did in their second round match, missing far too many returns not even putting himself in a position to play another shot. I think if Chardy is going to take his game to the next level, he needs to develop more of a complete, all-court game rather than relying as much on his forehand as he currently does.

Chardy's serve is an interestingly produced shot as well, often struggling with the ball toss, sometimes throwing it too far to the right. His serve is based around a big shoulder and hip rotation to the point where I think it would be easy for him to lose track of where the ball is once he has to hit it. He hit a couple of double faults in this match, mostly with bad ball tosses, or at least in a way that doesn't synchronise with how he set up to hit the stroke. When it works, he generates good pace and the slice serve out wide on the deuce court works out great breaking out wide away from the opponent.

In the end, the match seemed relatively simple. Chardy was able to control the points off the back of his own serve, but didn't have much of a look into Djokovic's. What Chardy needed to hope for was Djokovic to play a sloppy error-strewn game, which he finally did midway in the second set. This was when Djokovic was at his most vulnerable, at boiling point after smashing a racquet at the loss of the service game. Just when Chardy needed to capitalise on that with a strong passage of play, Chardy's game went to pieces returning the favour with an equally error-strewn service game.