Novak Djokovic interview: The World No 1 on his pursuit of perfection

On a drizzly afternoon in south-west London, the practice schedule for the indoor facilities at Queen’s Club, the venue of the annual grass-court tournament in mid-June, reads like a who’s who in men’s tennis. Roger Federer is up first, drilling backhands at coach Stefan Edberg, followed by the Bryan twins, and then Kei Nishikori. Inside there’s little chatter, just a quiet intensity, and the continuous, relentless crunch of ball on strings. The question on everyone’s lips is simple. How to stop Novak Djokovic? The ATP World Tour Finals get under way tomorrow at the O2 Arena, and Djokovic is perhaps as big a favourite to lift the title as anyone in the tournament’s history. Only Federer, during his dominant years of 2004 to 2007, can perhaps compare. But Djokovic has been recording numbers that even the great Swiss, in his pomp, could not muster. This season he has racked up six of the nine Masters 1000 titles, from the indoor hard courts of Paris to the clay of Rome. It might have been seven had he not elected to take a well-deserved rest during the Madrid tournament. No one has amassed such a haul before in a single season.