Mertens gets past Svitolina
MELBOURNE, Australia — A year after opting out of qualifying for the Australian Open, Elise Mertens has reached the semifinals in her debut at the season-opening Grand Slam.
Mertens upset fourth-seeded Elina Svitolina 6-4, 6-0 on Tuesday to extend her winning streak to 10 matches and be the first woman through to the semifinals at Melbourne Park.
She’s the first Belgian since Kim Clijsters in 2012 to reach the semifinals in Australia, and knew she had plenty of support at home.
“Kim, thanks for watching, I knew you sent me a message before the match — don’t be too stressy,” said Mertens, who trains at Clijsters’ academy.
“I’m trying to be in your footsteps this week.”
The No. 37-ranked Mertens successfully defended her Hobart International title — she decided last year to target that title instead of entering Open qualifying — two weeks ago, and has now won five matches at Melbourne Park.
Mertens dominated against Svitolina, who also entered her first quarterfinal in Australia on a ninematch winning roll after winning the Brisbane International two week ago.
Svitolina had won their only previous tour-level match, but had no answers on Rod Laver Arena and later said hip trouble had been bothering her all year.
“She played great from the beginning of the year,” Svitolina said. “But, you know, when I give her opportunities to play and to play a good level, then of course she’s going to play. She’s going to go for shots.
“Now she’s in [the] semifinal. Now she’s not just a player that’s up and down. She’s quite consistent, and we can see this.”
Mertens raced out to a 5-2 lead in the first set before Svitolina got her only service break. The second set was no contest. Mertens won a 27-point rally while holding serve in the fourth game, then hit a backhand winner into the open corner to break Svitolina in the next game for a 5-0 lead.
Svitolina framed an attempted overhead and hit it over the baseline to give Mertens match point, and the 22-year-old Belgian duly finished it with a backhand crosscourt winner to advance to her first major semifinal.
Mertens was one of the biggest movers on the women’s tour in 2017 as she improved her year-end ranking from 120 to 35 and won her first career title.
In the semis, she’ll play either second-seeded Caroline Wozniacki or Carla Suarez Navarro.
In other quarterfinals, top-seeded Rafael Nadal was playing No. 6 Marin Cilic and No. 3 Grigor Dimitrov faced
Kyle Edmund.
Earlier Monday, six-time champion Novak Djokovic and fifth-ranked Dominic Thiem lost in the fourth round, leaving Hyeon Chung and Tennys Sandgren playing for a spot in the semifinals.
The 58th-ranked Chung, 21, relentlessly attacked a clearly injured Djokovic in a 7-6 (4), 7-5, 7-6 (3) victory, becoming the first South Korean to reach the last eight at a Grand Slam.
Then there’s Sandgren. The 26-year-old from Tennessee had never won a Grand Slam match or beaten a top10 player until last week. The 97th-ranked Sandgren beat Thiem 6-2, 4-6, 7-6 (4), 6-7 (7), 6-3, following up on his earlier victory over 2014 Australian Open champion Stan Wawrinka.
He’s only the second man in 20 years to reach the quarterfinals in his debut at Melbourne Park.
The bespectacled Chung ripped 47 winners, including a forehand on the slide and at full stretch that put him within two points of victory, and credited Djokovic as his inspiration.
“When I’m young, I’m just trying to copy Novak because he’s my idol,” Chung said. “I can’t believe this tonight. Dreams come true tonight.”
Djokovic was playing his first competitive tennis since Wimbledon last July, and had to remodel his service swing to take some load off his injured right elbow.
He winced and grimaced throughout the match, particularly when stretching for backhands, and needed a medical timeout in the second
set for massage on his injured elbow.
The 12-time major champion said he would need to reassess the injury, but didn’t want his pain to detract from Chung’s victory.
“Amazing. Amazing performance,” said Djokovic, who was seeded 14th after his ranking slid in 2017 while he was off the tour. “Whenever he was in trouble, he came up with some unbelievable shots. Just from the back of the court, you know, he was like a wall.”
“When I’m young, I’m just trying to copy Novak because he’s my idol. I can’t believe this tonight. Dreams come true tonight.” Hyeon Chung, who defeated Novak Djokovic in the fourth round