I have ruined the main thread by reading  in comments and it is not possible to add comments to the main thread so here are the following player combinations in the following:

SEMIFINALISTS 

1     Carlos Alcaraz                   vs        3    Danill Medvedev

2     Novak Djokovic                 vs        Ben Shelton

There was a massive difference between the level of tennis played by the quarterfinalists in the Top Half of the Draw and the tennis played   by the quarterfinalists in the Bottom Half of the Draws,   The players like Medvedev and Alcaraz had to fight for points all the way and  that was in particular by the commentator on the match between Medvedev and Rublev the interviewer after the match referred to the fact by thanking both Medvedev and Rublev for playing spectacular tennis.

That makes Alcaraz the favorite to win in the final,   In that regard I think that in the unlikely event that Medvedev beats Alcaraz in the semifinal he will be favored to beat his opponent in the final.   

FINAL

2    Novak Djokovic   vs   3    Danill Medvedev 

Road to the final Summary

Novak Djokovic

Before the start of the tournament I wrote that irrespectoive of what happened in the rournament Djokovic will be the number 1 ranked player in the world because Alcaraz will lose 2000 ranking points as a result of the fact that he won the tournament as a 19  year=-old in 2022 and could only retain the points if he wins in the title again in 2023, while Djokovic will gain points in every round he played in.as a result of his absence from the tournament in 2022.

In further comments on the Draw I  wrote at the time that the draw made things very easy for Djokovic to reach the final.     In the Draw he was  the number 2 seeded player with the the other 4 Top 10 seeded players being  4  Rune,  5   Tsitsipas,  9  Fritz and 10 Tiafoe.   Aside from that the fact is that 11 of the 16 qualifiers were allocated to the bottom Half of the Draw - weakening that component further,

The result was that on rout to the final Djokovic played the following players:-

Round 1   -    Alexandre Muller      -    Ranked 82

Round 2   -    Bernabe Zapata Miralles  - Ranked 75

Round 3   -    Laslo Djere                 -    Ranked  37

Round 4   -    Borna Gojo                 -    Ranked  96

Quarterfinal  -   Taylor Fritz              -    Ranked   9

Semifinal   -    Ben Shelton               -     Ranked   46

The easiest route ever to the semifinal in any major tournament,    That leaves a major question mark as to Djokovic chance of winning the final.

Danill Mededev          

Round 1     -     Atilla Balazs                     -     Unranked

Round 2      -    Christopher O'Connell      -     Ranked 59

Round 3      -     Sebastian Baez                 -     Ranked 36

Round 4      -     Alex de Minaur                 -    Ranked  13   

Quarterfinal   -   Andrey Rublev                 -    Ranked   8

Semifinal      -    Carlos Alcaraz                  -    Ranked   1       .       

It was hard for Medvedev to get to the final - much harder than it was for Djokovic.    So who is going to win in the final?   Based on performances and the difficulty it was for Medvedev to reach the final I think Medvedev will win the final.    

There wa already an uproar since the draw was NOT done in public - like it was in the past and in future it will not happen again.   

Congrats to Djokovic for winning  the US Open.    .    

’I think Medvedev will win the final’…..I missed that pearl of wisdom…..often wrong, never uncertain. Stick to conspiracy theories you don’t have a clue about tennis,

Thanks Mozart for your wisdom.  You are always wrong about everything  you write on site because prejudice is always the norm.   

You cannot claim that  Djokovic had a difficult route to the final.   The only top 30 Ranked player he played in the whole series was against Fritz - who have not won a single title since Indian Wells in 2022,   For the ret he played against nobody of any substance and was clearly going into the final with minimal effort.

One thing is to my mind clear - I do not think Djokovic will win a single Gran d Slam title next year.   If he does it will be with the luck of a pox-doctor.    

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