Andy Murray, of the United Kingdom, left, and Kei Nishikori, of Japan, cross paths after Nishikori won the fourth set of their match during the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open tennis tournament, Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2016, in New.
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Next up for Murray is Japan’s Kei Nishikori who was a 6-3 6-4 7-6 (4) victor over Ivo Karlovic.
The upset ended a stellar run by Murray that had taken him to seven successive finals, including victories at Wimbledon, the Rio Olympics, Queen’s Club and Rome.
And either Juan Martin del Potro, the Olympic finalist, or third seed Stan Wawrinka is lurking ahead.
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Both players saw their form hit peaks and troughs at nearly minute-by-minute intervals as the scoreline ended up with Nishikori winning 1-6 6-4 4-6 6-1 7-5, the Japanese twice fighting back after falling a set behind in the match.
“Andy is the best player right now out there”, Dimitrov said.
Murray says he is proud of his latest tennis achievement but is concentrating on the wider success that will see him progress to the last eight of the competition.
He was the one who usually made the first strike in the rallies or trying to shift the point with a net rushing, and it was paying off, as Murray couldn’t harm him from the position way behind the baseline.
“I could have won the match for sure”, said Murray, the No. 2 seed and 2012 champion at Flushing Meadows.
“I served a bunch in the low 130s, mid-130s, which was good”. Then just five days later in Glasgow, he will spearhead the British drive to reach a second Davis Cup final in as many years and successfully defend the trophy.
The Scot received a standing ovation from the 24,000 NY crowd at the end of a two hour demolition job on world number 24 Grigor Dimitrov that was arguably the best individual performance of the tournament so far.
“Tactically I played a good match”, he said.
It was a very comfortable first set for Murray, who held his four service games in addition to securing two breaks to claim the opener in just 37 minutes of tennis in NY.
Konjuh knocked off fourth-seeded Agnieszka Radwanska, avenging her heartbreaking loss to the Pole in the second round at Wimbledon, while Pliskova ousted Venus Williams to make the last eight of a Grand Slam for the first time after 17 prior attempts.
Murray had to save two break points in the opening game and Dimitrov then held serve easily.
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Any hopes by Dimitrov of starting afresh in the second set were quickly extinguished as he quickly went down 0-3. I had to change something to win the match. [He has] a great first serve, and second serve too. “And I served very well when I was behind in the games”.
