Djokovic blames setting sun for Monte Carlo exit

World number two Novak Djokovic, who slumped to a shocking quarter-final exit in the ongoing Monte-Carlo Rolex Masters, has said his failure to adjust to the tricky light in the third set led to his loss against Belgium's David Goffin.

The Serb battled back from a set down to force a deciding set, which was eventually sealed by Goffin, who recorded his first ever win over Djokovic. The final score read 2-6, 6-3, 5-7 in favour of the Belgian.

Following the defeat, Djokovic said it was almost unplayable in the third set because the setting sun was affecting the ball toss on serve, with half the court was in the shade and the other was in sunlight.

"It was almost unplayable.I just got disturbed by that light. On 4-3 I lost that serve. On that side, it's kind of hard to find timing when somebody's kind of putting a flashlight directly in your eyes. Both of us struggled on that side. He managed to hold serve on 5-all from that side, which was a great effort from him. But I couldn't," Sport24 quoted Djokovic as saying.

Talking about his performance in the match, Djokovic said he made a slow start to the match because he was feeling extremely fatigued due to his previous two matches, both of which were three-set battles.

"I started slowly probably because I played two long matches. But I thought as the match progressed I was feeling okay. You know, I was physically fine. We had a lot of exchanges, a lot of rallies. David is playing very quick. He's a fast player. I thought I played very, very well for a set and a half, from the start of the second set," the 12-time Grand Slam winner said.

The defeat marks the continuation of Djokovic's poor start to the year as he failed to make it to the semi-finals in his last four tournament.