Lucas Pouille of France celebrates after winning match point against Rafael Nadal of Spain (not pictured) on day seven of the 2016 U.S. Open tennis tournament at USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center. guile won 6-1, 2-6, 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 (6).
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“The problem is arriving at six-all in the fifth, I should be winning before”, said Nadal, who opened the fifth set with a break but couldn’t hold onto it, dropping his own serve in the eighth to make it 4-4 and set the stage for the tiebreaker.
“With three match points I thought, “you are going to win this one”. “But I need something else. I have good feelings on the court, so we’ll see”. That he’s done it by playing only two complete matches because three opponents pulled out of the tournament with injuries is as odd as can be. But Pouille, a 22-year-old with flashy strokes, presented a much greater challenge in the fourth round, pushing Nadal to the limit through entertaining, tense – and intense – exchanges.
“It’s just never over until the last point”.
A forehand error from Pouille gifted Nadal the first point but four points in a row saw the Frenchman take control and he brought up three match points as he closed in on the finishing line.
The loss ends a thrilling run from Pouille, who defeated 14-time grand slam victor Rafael Nadal to get to the last eight in a grand slam for the second time.
The 34-year-old Monroe was in the third round in doubles at a Grand Slam for the first time. He was eliminated in the first round of the Australian Open this past year, and a wrist injury forced him to drop out of the French Open before the third round and forgo Wimbledon altogether.
Monfils broke within moments of their return to go two sets ahead, before swiftly running into a 3-1 lead in the third – Pouille’s steam had long since run out. Tsonga made that one break of serve but his was under constant threat, as Novak created 9 break chances and took 4, breaking his rival twice in every set. A gritty Nadal battled back to level the breaker at 6-all as the excitement within Arthur Ashe Stadium reached a breaking point. Anyone’s match to win.
“I knew if I wanted to win that, it’s not going to be like three sets, 6-1, 6-2, 6-2”.
Trailing 6-5, and serving at love-40, Vinci missed her first serve, then was called for a foot fault on a second serve.
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Nadal had reached the fourth round with minimal fuss and he was favourite to prevail against 24th seed Pouille, who had already gone the distance on two occasions during the opening week at Flushing Meadows. Pouille played conservatively, hitting short shots and making sure they landed in. At 6-6 in the breaker, Nadal had a brilliant opportunity to bring up a match point but dumped his forehand into the net with the court wide open. I fought right up to the last ball. I put [myself] in a position to have the victor, and I had the mistake. “He’s a potential top 10 and could fight for the big things the next couple of years”. That’s it. You can not go insane thinking about these kind of things.
