Andrey Rublev reached the quarterfinals of the Australian Open

On the eighth day of the Australian Open, which passed its equator in Melbourne, Andrei Rublev won a hard-fought victory in the fourth round, breaking the resistance of Australian Alex de Minaur in five games in more than four hours. For a place in the semi-finals, the Russian will compete with Italian Jannik Sinner, who is one of the four main contenders for victory in the tournament and beat Karen Khachanov in three sets.

By the beginning of the meeting between Andrei Rublev and Alex de Minaur, which the organizers of the Australian Open, as one might expect, made on Sunday central and put on prime time on the main arena, the other three Russian players who played their fourth round matches that day were defeated. Last year’s Russian semi-finalist of the Melbourne Major, Karen Khachanov, lost to Jannik Sinner in three sets, but this result was rather expected. Still, the Italian is one of the real contenders for the title, and he remains the only participant in the men’s tournament who has not lost a single set. In general, we can say that Khachanov fulfilled his minimum task. In any case, he beat the opponents who were ranked below him, thanks to which he will most likely retain his place in the top twenty of the Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) rankings.

Among the women, Maria Timofeeva, who after six wins in a row in qualifying and the main draw did not have enough strength to cope with the skillful Ukrainian Marta Kostyuk, and 16-year-old Mirra Andreeva, dropped out of the fight. She lost in three sets to veteran Czech Barbora Krejcikova, who defeated the young Russian in their three matches, but booked her place in the world’s top 40 for the first time.

Rublev, compared to Khachanov and his two compatriots, seemed to be in a more promising situation. If only because he was ranked higher than his opponent.

True, this advantage was conditional. Having made four finals at ATP tournaments last season and winning one of them in Acapulco, the 24-year-old Australian broke into the top ten of the ATP rankings for the first time two weeks ago. Fast feet, an excellent feel for the ball, allowing you to use a wide variety of spins, and enviable durability are trump cards with which you can claim a lot, even without being very powerful. From this point of view, Alex de Minaur, training under the guidance of former world number one and captain of the Australian Davis Cup team Lleyton Hewitt, was the complete opposite of the Americans Sebastian Korda and especially Chris Eubanks – two tennis players of a stronger nature, with whom Rublev confidently dealt with two previous rounds.

The first set was left to the Russian, who had some gaming superiority in the second game. However, Rublev failed to take someone else’s serve, and in the tiebreaker it was de Minaur who was more accurate, who caught the courage and rushed into the attack in time. At the beginning of the third game, the Australian managed to build on his success, lead with a break and maintain the advantage until the tenth game on his serve. It ended with a double fault, but Rublev also failed in the second tiebreaker. De Minaur carried the most difficult balls, responding to all the attacks of the Russian.

The Australian’s problem was that such an energy-intensive game gradually drained his strength, without which it is impossible to successfully complete five-set marathons. Rublev, of course, also looked tired and made mistakes more and more often, performing his signature right hands on straight legs, but de Minaur’s reserves were dwindling much faster. Having played a break in the fifth game of the fourth set, he immediately lost his serve again, gave up the game and completely lost the thread of the game.

The Russian only needed to not miss the victory, and he was able to maintain concentration – won twelve points in a row, and then gave a series of seven successful games, recording de Minaru with a “steering wheel” in the fifth set.

As a result, a week after the first five-set match at this tournament, against the Brazilian Thiago Zeyboth Wild, the Russian won another marathon victory in 4 hours 14 minutes. Thus, Rublev managed to confirm his last year’s result at the Australian Open, reaching the quarterfinals for the tenth time at a Grand Slam tournament. However, for the first time it will be very difficult for a Russian to overcome this familiar barrier. Sinner looks too powerful in Melbourne. In the other quarterfinal, Novak Djokovic will play against American Taylor Fritz in the top half of the bracket, and here, given the head-to-head score of 8:0 in favor of the Serbian, the favorite looks even more obvious.

Evgeniy Fedyakov