Murray continued where he left off in the second, breaking in the first game for an early lead, though an out-of-sorts Dimitrov did manage to get himself on the board, having broken back to trail 3-1. “I had no choice”.
Advertisement
Should del Potro make the semi-finals he would be the lowest-ranked man to do so at a Grand Slam since 237th-ranked Vladimir Voltchkov at Wimbledon in 2000. “I’m doing in a good way because I’m playing good tennis”.
The 2012 champion at Flushing Meadows will face No. 6 seed Kei Nishikori in the quarterfinals Wednesday.
Still exhausted after the stunning run to an Olympic silver medal that announced him as a contender again, he got a huge break in spending only 72 minutes on court.
Juan Martin del Potro, Andy Murray and the Williams sisters are among those seeking to book their spots in the quarterfinals on Labor Day Monday at the U.S. Open.
The 27-year-old is unseeded and needed a wildcard even to enter in NY after a chronic wrist injury saw him miss nine grand slams in a row and his ranking plummet.
In the 25th anniversary year of his memorable run to U.S. Open semifinals at age 39, Jimmy Connors came up a lot Monday.
Third seed Wawrinka, victor of the 2014 Australian Open and 2015 French Open, overpowered the 63rd-ranked Marchenko, who reached the fourth round when 14th-seeded Nick Kyrgios retired with a hip injury while trailing two sets to one.
Del Potro will face Wawrinka in the quarters, after his eighth seeded Austrian rival Dominic Thiem withdrew while trailing 3-6, 2-3 in the second set with a right knee pain despite receiving assistance from the physiotherapist.
The Austrian blamed compensating for blisters on his feet for a problem with his knee that forced him to bring an end to the match after consulting with trainers.
“I couldn’t bend it too much the last three days”, he said. He didn’t want to take any risks with a knee injury and planned to get an MRI.
The top-seeded Williams is 308-42 at major tournaments, an.880 winning percentage, and is now three more wins from her 23rd Grand Slam singles title, which would break a tie with Steffi Graf for the most in the Open era, which started in 1968. “I learn from this and I just keep going”.
Wawrinka next faces 2009 U.S. Open champ Juan Martin del Potro, who beat him at Wimbledon this year. Scot finished the match with 28 winners and 23 errors, enough to give him an easy win before the ultimate challenges that are waiting for him from the next round. But all those victories came with a cost – a tour-high 69 matches, and the long season had started to wear on his body.
Only one of them, del Potro, will continue to be compared to Connors this week. He has played just 10-plus sets through four rounds, but still expects to be the underdog.
Advertisement
Del Potro returned to the circuit in February and pulled off a memorable victory at Wimbledon by ousting Stan Wawrinka before tiring against Lucas Pouille – the flashy Frenchman who upset Rafael Nadal on Sunday. With already 65 matches on his tally before the US Open, playing in nearly every week from April to July, Thiem obviously pushed himself to the limits and that had to stop sooner or later.
