The unstopable Djokovic outlasts Murray for fifth title at Australian Open

When the world No. 1 beat sixth-seed Andy Murray 7-6 (5) 6-7 (4) 6-3 6-0 in a contentious slugfest in Melbourne, he become only the second man to claim five Australian Open titles.

And with Djokovic 27, odds are that he'll match Roy Emerson's record haul of six. Emerson was in attendance Sunday along with other Australian tennis legends, including Rod Laver.

"I love my time being here," Djokovic told reporters. "Being mentioned in the elite group of legends in our sport is a huge privilege and honor. I can't say how proud I am.

"That's going to serve definitely only as a great deal of inspiration for the rest of my career."

This was the third time Djokovic downed the Scot in a final at Melbourne Park and how Murray will be ruing blowing a lead in the third set. Mind you, Djokovic let slip a 4-2 advantage in the second set and thus might have won in three if not for a lapse. 

Djokovic looked spent physically early in the second and in the opening stages of the third, by which time the two had been on court for almost three hours. 

He wobbled on his feet, struggled to get serves in play and went to ground after a rally.

Not that Murray wanted to buy into any of it. He felt the Serb was bluffing and could be heard uttering on court about his friend: "Don't worry about him, he does it all the time."

Murray, though, did let it get to him. 

"He obviously looked like he was in quite a bad way at the beginning of the third set and came back unbelievable at the end of that set," Murray told reporters afterward. "Then obviously the way he was hitting the ball in the fourth and moving was impressive.

"If it was cramp, how he recovered from it, that's a tough thing to recover from and play as well as he did at the end.

"So, yeah, I'm frustrated at myself for letting that bother me at the beginning of the third set, because I was playing well, I had good momentum, and then just dropped off for like 10 minutes and it got away from me."

Djokovic overturned a 2-0 hole in the third and saved a break point at 3-3 when he struck a drop volley that forced Murray into an error. 

Djokovic immediately urged the crowd to back him and they did. Energized, he didn't lose another game to collect his eighth major overall to join among others Murray's former coach, Ivan Lendl.

A cool handshake at the net after roughly four hours of play followed.