IPTL: Novak Djokovic announces his arrival

NEW DELHI: It was almost like a dessert after the main course. World No. 1 Novak Djokovic proved to be a mere secondary attraction on the day in spite of making his International Premier Tennis League (IPTL) debut for the UAE Royals on Sunday night.
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After world No. 2 Roger Federer held centrestage in the first match of the day, Djoker played support cast at the Indira Gandhi Indoor stadium.
The Serbian didn't even have a place to sit on the Royals bench for a while as he opened his campaign in a doubles appearance with Nenad Zimonjic against the Manila Mavericks pair of Jo-Wilfred Tsonga and Daniel Nestor.
The 'Djoker' tried his best to rally the crowd, a thinned-out one as many fans had left after the Federer show, and pushed the men's doubles set into a tiebreaker but it was Tsonga's huge serves in the 5minute shoot-out that settled the issue for the Mavericks.
Earlier, the unerring Mark Phillipoussis put the Mavericks ahead with a 6-3 win over Goran Ivanisevic which was followed up by a hard-fought 6-5 win for Marin Cilic, representing the Royals, over Tsonga.
In the mixed doubles, Mavericks' Kristen Flipkens and Nestor steamrolled Kristina Mladenovic and Zimonjic 6-2 to give their team a 23-16 lead before the final women's tie of the day. Caroline Wozniacki won 8 out of her 12 games in the final set but couldn't prevent a 24-27 loss for the Royals.
Scores: Manila Mavericks bt UAE Royals 27-24 (Mark Phillipousis bt Goran Ivanisevic 6-3; Marin Cilic bt JoWilfred Tsonga 6-5; TsongaDaniel Nestor bt Novak DjokovicNenad Zimonjic 6-5; Kirsten FlipkensNestor bt Kristina MladenovicZimonjic 6-2; Caroline Wozniacki bt Kirsten Flipkens 8-4).
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