At the ensuing changeover, Djokovic was visited by the trainer, who pressed a thumb just above the back of the player’s right elbow, while manipulating that joint in various ways.
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Wozniacki, twice the runner-up at Flushing Meadows, will meet No. 2 Angelique Kerber in Thursday’s semifinals.
Wozniacki is a former No. 1 who is ranked only 74th after a tough season that included injuries and zero Grand Slam match wins until last week. But she eliminated 2004 champion Svetlanta Kuznetsova in the second round and No. 8 Madison Keys in the fourth.
It’s the first time since 1947 that three French men have reached the quarter-finals of one Grand Slam.
Wozniacki is back in the last-eight of a major for the first time since making the semi-finals in NY in 2014.
ON THIS DATE (Sept. 7, 1953): Maureen Connolly becomes the first woman to complete a Grand Slam, beating Doris Hart 6-2, 6-4 for the women’s singles title.
Marc Lopez teamed with Rafael Nadal to win the gold medal in men’s doubles at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics. “She played so well past year here”. “I didn’t have much time on the court overall before the fourth round”, said Djokovic who came into the tournament suffering from a wrist injury.
But 22-year-old Pouille is now Grand Slam hardened having made a maiden Slam quarter-final at Wimbledon.
Vinci is now ranked No. 8.
Vinci has been dealing with an injured left Achilles tendon – she wore black tape in the shape of a “V” that framed her left calf – and a bad back.
“Of course I was a bit exhausted today”.
“Sure, I would like to wake up and not feel any pain”, she said. “Putting aside my injuries, I’m playing good tennis”.
Murray won the first of his three career majors at the US Open in 2012 and will be the favourite to make a fourth semi-final at the season’s last Grand Slam.
Roberta Vinci fell apart after losing the opening set on a foot fault, allowing No. 2 seed Angelique Kerber to take the last nine games and win their U.S. Open quarterfinal 7-5, 6-0 on Tuesday. That seems to be shifting in 2016, and a sharply focused Monfils is 18-2 in matches he’s played since a first-round loss at Wimbledon – including the highest-level tournament title of his career at Washington.
Pouille, meanwhile, ran out of steam.
“Is true that I don’t have lot of matches on my shoulders for the last three, four months, but even like this I lost an opportunity”, Nadal said.
Kerber, who has a chance to overtake Serena Williams at No. 1 after the tournament, moved into her third Grand Slam semifinal of the year. She beat Williams to win the Australian Open for her first major championship, then lost to Williams in the Wimbledon final in July.
Wozniacki is a two-time U.S. Open runner-up, at least.
World number one Djokovic, the champion in NY in 2011 and 2015, has hardly broken sweat in the first four rounds. Then, trailing 6-5, and serving at love-40, Vinci was called for a foot fault on a second serve.
“It was really hard because he played great in the third, but I have no regrets about this set because he played well”, Tsonga said. In addition, she will have surgery on a toe she broke at the Australian Open in January 2015.
Novak Djokovic, of Serbia, hits a return shot to Kyle Edmund, of Britain, during the fourth round of the U.S. Open tennis tournament, Sunday, Sept. 4, 2016, in NY.
The No. 1-seeded defending champ Djokovic takes on ninth-seeded Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, one of three French players in the quarterfinals. Monfils won the previous meeting in five sets at last year’s Australian Open.
Kerber’s first U.S. Open semifinal since 2011 will come against two-time runner-up Caroline Wozniacki, a 6-0, 6-2 victor over Anastasija Sevastova, who injured her right ankle in the second game and was never able to get herself going in the match.
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The roof on Ashe may be a factor.
