Dimitrov ousts home favourite Kyrgios to book place in quarters alongside Nadal
Bulgaria’s world No 3 Grigor Dimitrov won a gripping four-setter to knock Australia’s big hope Nick Kyrgios out of the Australian Open yesterday.
Dimitrov downed the 17th seeded Kyrgios 7-6, 7-6, 4-6, 7-6 in 3 hours, 26 minutes and will face Britain’s Kyle Edmund in the quarter-finals at Melbourne Park tomorrow.
Dimitrov stepped up his campaign after a couple of indifferent wins in the earlier rounds to avenge his defeat to Kyrgios in the semi-finals of this month’s Brisbane International.
He won all three tie-breakers in a charged night match atmosphere on Rod Laver Arena before a capacity home crowd willing their player on.
“Playing against Nick is always tricky, two weeks I lost against him,” Dimitrov said. “He was serving and playing unbelievable and he fought really hard. It’s one of those matches that you have to be locked in and try to get any opportunity you have.
“Even when I was serving for the match I felt that I was not finding my spots very well and I’m just glad I got through that match.”
Kyrgios double-faulted to lose the opening set tie-breaker and was broken in the seventh game of the second set leaving the moody Australian to shake his head, cussing at the changeover and uttering “embarrassing.”
But he broke back with Dimitrov serving out for the set to bring up another tiebreaker.
It was the Bulgarian’s greater poise and depth of shot that carried him through with Kyrgios frequently missing the lines.
The Australian broke early in the third set in his do-or-die bid to stay in the match and took the set with an ace.
But Dimitrov got a crucial service break in the eighth game of the fourth set when Kyrgios put a smash into the net to allow the Bulgarian to serve out for the match.
The unpredictable Australian managed to break back to force a third tie-breaker. Again Dimitrov was too steady for Kyrgios, getting to three match points and winning it with a forehand pass.
Elsewhere in the men’s draw, world No 1 Rafael Nadal guaranteed he will stay in the position, even if he does not go on to win the tournament, after reaching the quarter-finals with a 6-3, 6-7, 6-3, 6-3 win over Diego Schwartzman.
Nadal dropped the second set to the Argentine player, but the Spaniard rallied strongly to set up a last-eight meeting with Marin Cilic.
It was a great battle,” said Nadal. “Of course, I feel little bit tired, but I was able to keep fighting until the end.”
Meanwhile, in the women’s draw, Caroline Wozniacki moved a step closer to a first grand slam title with a dominant display against 19th seed Magdalena Rybarikova in the fourth round.
The second seed was too good for the 2017 Wimbledon semi-finalist 6-3, 6-0 and said: “I think you can tell my confidence is pretty good at the moment.” Wozniacki, whose best previous run at the Australian Open was in 2011, goes up unseeded Carla Suarez Navarro for a spot in the semi-finals tomorrow.
The other woman’s quarter-final match set for tomorrow sees fourth seed Elina Svitolina go up against Belgian Elise Mertens after the pair respectively defeated Denisa Allertova and Petra Martic.
Svitolina said of her form: “Winning Brisbane gave me a lot of confidence and I’m very pleased with my performances here so far.”