MELBOURNE, Australia — Daniil Medvedev is through to the Australian Open quarterfinals along with Olympic champion Alexander Zverev, with the high-ranked players continuing to advance in the men’s draw.
Seeded players in the women’s draw kept tumbling out on Monday, allowing Dayana Yastremska and Linda Noskova to advance to the quarterfinals of a Grand Slam for the first time.
Medvedev, a two-time Australian Open runner-up, beat No. 69-ranked Nuno Borges 6-3, 7-6 (4), 5-7, 6-1 and will next face No. 9 Hubert Hurkacz, who ended the run of French wild-card entry Arthur Cazaux 7-6 (6), 7-6 (3), 6-4.
The sixth-seeded Zverev made it to the quarterfinals in Australia for the third time with a 7-5, 3-6, 6-3, 4-6, 7-6 (3) win over No. 19 Cameron Norrie in just over four hours.
Their match on Margaret Court Arena was delayed briefly when a protester threw anti-war pamphlets onto the back of the court in the third set. The protester was escorted out by security.
Yastremska beat two-time champion and 18th seed Victoria Azarenka 7-6 (6), 6-4, and No. 23-seeded Elina Svitolina had to retire after hurting her back when she was trailing Noskova 3-0.
Azarenka served for the first set twice and had two set points at 6-5 but couldn’t take them and Yastremska won the opening set in 74 minutes. Yastremska was down a break in the second but finished on a roll, too, winning six of the last seven games.
“I think I need to take a thousand breaths because my heart I think is going to jump out of my body,” Yastremska said. “During the match, I was imagining how I lost already like 25 times. I was losing the tiebreak, second set I was losing, I always felt I was running behind the train.
“But because I’m a little bit of a fighter I think I won this match.” There was no handshake, as is the convention between Ukrainian players and opponents from Russia and Belarus.
The first game of the Noskova-Svitolina match lasted 11 minutes and contained 20 points. Noskova broke serve and held for 2-0 before Svitolina had a timeout and received treatment on her lower back.
When she resumed, the Ukrainian’s serve speed was well down and her movement appeared compromised. After being broken for a second time and holding back tears, Svitolina shook Noskova’s hand and retired.
“I got a spasm, like a shooting pain,” she said. “Couldn’t do anything, completely locked my back, just very sad. I had some injuries to my back before where it just was tiredness … but this one was really out of nowhere. I felt like someone shot me in the back.”
The 19-year-old Noskova beat top-ranked Iga Swiatek in the third round and now is the youngest player to reach the Australian Open women’s singles quarterfinals since 2008.
“Obviously today was not the way I had planned to win,” she said. “I feel for Elina, I hope she gets very well soon.”
Medvedev had two match points at 5-4 in the third set but Borges forced a fourth, only to fade as the Russian pulled away for victory.
“Third set was tough physically because he was playing very aggressive,” Medvedev said. “As soon as I would hit one shot that was not aggressive or deep enough he would just go full power. It was pretty impressive.
“After the third set, I just hoped it would not be five sets and I’m glad it wasn’t.”
Later Monday, men’s No. 2 Carlos Alcaraz bids for a place in the last eight when he plays Miomir Kecmanovic of Serbia.
___
AP tennis: https://apnews.com/hub/tennis
Be the first to comment