Novak Djokovic’s run in Shanghai has highlighted a big issue in men’s tennis

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With his triumph over Zizou Bergs, Novak Djokovic clinched his 80th Masters 1000 semifinal and 10th at the Shanghai Masters.

The Serb, seeded fourth at the tournament, has powered through brutal conditions as well as an injury scare en route to the final four in China, and he is not done yet.

After Djokovic’s triumph over Bergs, he is set to face qualifier Valentin Vacherot for a place in the final, where he will seek to clinch a record-extending 41st Masters title.

His run at the ATP 1000 event has been nothing short of remarkable, and while the 24-time major champion continues to make history on the tour, his heroics have highlighted a big issue in men’s tennis.

The problem underlined by Novak Djokovic’s Shanghai campaign

Despite featuring at just 12 ATP tournaments this year, Djokovic has found himself in an incredible position heading into the end of the season.

Having played a limited schedule in 2025, he is now third in the ‘Race to Turin’, the annual battle for one of eight places in the ATP Finals.

Djokovic has a current tally of 4580 live points in the race, and he will almost certainly qualify for the year-end tournament.

He has a tally 300 points greater than fourth-placed Alexander Zverev, who has played in 21 tour-level events this year, nine more than the 38-year-old.

Taylor Fritz, Ben Shelton, Alex de Minaur and Lorenzo Musetti, who make up places five through eight, have, like Zverev, all played in several more competitions this season than Djokovic, and yet they all trail him in qualification points.

Outside of Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz, no player has been able to muster up more live points in 20-plus events than a man who has appeared at just 12.

The difference in live points between Djokovic and those below him highlights how inconsistent stars not named Sinner or Alcaraz have been on tour in 2025.

The inconsistency of the ATP top ten at Grand Slams in 2025

The biggest display of inconsistency among the rest of the field has come at Grand Slam events, where the most live points were on offer.

Zverev, for example, advanced to the final of the Australian Open and managed to reach the quarterfinals of Roland Garros, but crashed out in the first and third rounds of Wimbledon and the US Open, respectively.

Fritz’s major season saw a similar story to the German, but in reverse, bowing out in the early stages in Melbourne and Paris, before making the semifinals in London, and the last eight in New York.

With Djokovic reaching four Grand Slam semifinals in the twilight of his career, bested only by either Sinner or Alcaraz at three of the four majors, the rest of the tour has plenty of work to do if they want to catch up.