Novak Djokovic is in formidable form at the Miami Open, but he has been handed a distraction amid his search for further silverware.
Juan Martin del Potro watched Djokovic win his Miami Open round of 16 tie with Lorenzo Musetti, which set up a clash with Sebastian Korda.
The meeting with the American comes after Djokovic beat Rinky Hijikata and Camilo Ugo Carabelli in rounds two and three respectively.
Djokovic stunned Andy Roddick with the latter victory, with the Serbian having secured a record 411th ATP Masters 1000 win.
But his focus now turns to American ace Korda in their last 16 match, which was postponed by one day by the ATP Tour.
Paul Annacone surprised by ATP rule after Novak Djokovic Miami Open match postponed
Its rules state that a match cannot start past 11pm local time, with Roger Federer’s former coach Paul Annacone and former player CoCo Vandeweghe both sharing their verdicts on that ruling.
“Look, this has been a long time in the making, and these guys have been sitting around for a very long time to play,” Annacone told Tennis Channel.
“My only issue really is that there’s not a caveat, or there’s no little addendum to the rule, because neither of these guys would play tomorrow.
READ MORE: Andy Roddick takes aim at the ATP as he claims there’s a big issue which they have simply got to fix
“So to me, this is a situation where if they both wanted to play, let them play. If one didn’t want to play, then you don’t play. That’s how I would do it.
“But I’m surprised that the rule is not written that way, but my days as a tour board member are long over.”
Vandeweghe responded: “Good, you don’t have to be the commissioner anymore Paul. I’ve dealt with this scenario myself as a player at Miami.
“I was following Rafa Nadal playing Fernando Verdasco. I was going to play Sam Stosur. We didn’t finish till 3am because we didn’t get on the court until midnight.
“Finish at three, get home by five, you cool down. I had Serena Williams who just beat the living snot out of me come quarters, but I’m going to give a little bit of a caveat to that late finish.
“So I’m glad that the tours are finally helping the players. But again, there is Grandstand, there’s other courts that some matches could have maybe gone off to instead of filling up Stadium and Stadium only, just to kind of give the schedule a little bit of a breather.”
Paul Annacone details ‘nightmare’ scenario after Miami Open postponement
Given differing match lengths and other factors such as weather, scheduling such major events isn’t always straightforward.
Djokovic and Korda must now reset and get ready to go again, but organisers will be eager to avoid a repeat scenario in the future.
Former WTA top 10 player Vandeweghe also shared insight into the minds of the two ATP stars, having been asked if she would have chosen not to play in their situation.
READ MORE: Tennis chiefs slammed for ‘terrible idea’ across the ATP and WTA tours which has caused ‘carnage’
“I think I wouldn’t, just because of who knows how long that women’s match was going to be when the question was proposed to both Seb and Novak,” she said.
“We don’t know how early that was proposed, that question. So the question mark, okay, the women go to the third, do we have another hour? Is it going to be 20 minutes?
“That kind of scenario you don’t know. Me personally, I would have said let’s go the next day, give me an extra day to get my legs recovered. That’s what I would have done.”
Annacone then commented: “Yeah I think, like I said, I totally understand that. My only scenario is the fact that they weren’t going to play tomorrow, those guys that wouldn’t have to come back.
“And if they don’t want to play, that’s fine. I just think this could be a situation where you let them decide, because they only really found out about 20 minutes before the end of this match, so they literally just left the grounds.
“So at that point when they’re talking to them, this is a situation where it’s going to be really tough for the fans.
“There’s still a few people that I think want to watch Novak Djokovic and Seb play tonight, but there’s so many instances just like you mentioned CoCo, where it’s three in the morning, you come back the next day, it’s a nightmare. But if you have the next day off like these guys would have, I would let them decide.”
Receive exclusive tennis news and updates twice a week to your mailbox
