How Marriage and Fatherhood Made Djokovic an Awesome Player by Chinwuba Iyizoba

14 07 2015

Joys of married life and fatherhood have transformed Novak Djokovic into an awesome athlete.

After winning the recently conclude Wimbledon tournament, he deliberately connected the dots between his family stability and his success.

“Ever since I got married and became a father, I haven’t lost many matches, I won many tournaments. I suggest that to every player, Get married, have kids, let’s enjoy this,” a beaming Djokovic said as he celebrated his first wedding anniversary by winning his third Wimbledon title.

He lifted the gold trophy after a 7-6(1) 6-7(10) 6-4 6-3 victory over second-seeded Swiss great Roger Federer.

Djokovic’s married life helps him keep focus on what is important here and now, while forgetting the past failures and his success is an indictment of other top players and media people who caricature marriage and having children as an impediment to success rather than an aid.

He admits that his family, his loved ones are his driving force that makes failure not an option. “If there is one thing that I learned, it is to recover fast and to leave things behind me and move on,” the 28-year-old Serbian said after he became the oldest man in the professional era to win nine grand slam titles.

In a profoundly materialistic and individualistic culture of no-fault divorces and the recognition of same-sex unions as “marriages”, many often fail to see the purpose of marriage and find fewer reasons to make their own marriages work. This makes it all the more important to talk about the benefits of marriage between a man and a woman for procreation of children and for the comfort and mutual support of one another.

In fact since the birth of his son Stefan last October, the world number one has lost only three of 61 matches and collected eight titles, including the Australian Open and Wimbledon. But even more, he sprang crushing defeat in losing the FrenFrench Open to the triumph of lifting Wimbledon trophy in a space of just five weeks. He met his wife, Jelena Ristić, in high school, and began dating her in 2005. The two became engaged in September 2013 and on 10 July 2014 the couple got married on Sveti Stefan in Montenegro, while a church wedding was held in the same place, on 12 July 2014, in the Church of Saint Stephen

Chinwuba Iyizoba is the Editor of Authors-choice and the Author of After the Juju man, a historical fiction