Australian Alex de Minaur stuns Daniil Medvedev to reach French Open quarter-finals

PARIS – Alex de Minaur broke a 20-year Australian hoodoo at the French Open on June 3, as the 11th seed battled from a set down to stun fifth seed Daniil Medvedev 4-6, 6-2, 6-1, 6-3 and advance to his first Roland Garros quarter-final.

De Minaur became the first man from his nation to reach the last eight at the clay-court Grand Slam since Lleyton Hewitt in 2004, with the victory on Court Suzanne-Lenglen seemingly aided by Medvedev’s mid-match blip due to a foot problem.

The 25-year-old nicknamed “Demon” said: “I didn’t expect to be in the quarter-finals here, I didn’t play very well on the clay the past few years.

“Against Daniil it’s always very tactical, we both defend well, but I’m so happy to have won today.”

Medvedev, who reached the quarter-finals in 2021, had lost only twice in eight previous meetings with de Minaur. And the Russian drew first blood with a break in the third game but was pushed hard in the next before extending his lead.

De Minaur drew loud cheers from the crowd as he retrieved shots relentlessly to mount a late comeback attempt from there but Medvedev wrapped up the opening set with little fuss to briefly dampen his opponent’s spirits.

Medvedev shrugged off a string of superb winners from de Minaur at the start of the second set but surrendered it tamely with an unforced error after taking a medical timeout for blisters on his foot.

With the momentum shifting, de Minaur blazed to a 5-1 lead en route to winning the third set, before he traded breaks with Medvedev early in the fourth and pulled away shortly after for a famous win.

This matches de Minaur’s deepest run at a Major, having made the US Open quarter-finals in 2020.

World No. 5 Medvedev is the highest singles seed to fall at this year’s tournament.

In the women’s draw, world No. 4 Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan sent out a warning to her fellow title contenders as she eased to a 6-4, 6-3 victory over Elina Svitolina on June 3 to reach her second French Open quarter-final.

After a sluggish start with both players dropping serve, Russian-born Rybakina raised her level and cruised through the first set.

In the second set, Svitolina was no match again for Rybakina as the 19th-ranked Ukrainian showed signs of fatigue from the start and lacked precision under the long-awaited sun after a wet first week on the Paris red clay.

Rybakina said she would need to be more consistent when she plays 15th-ranked Italian Jasmine Paolini, who reached the last eight of a Grand Slam for the first time.

“It’s all about focus now, the matches are getting tougher, the opening also, so I think it’s a lot about the consistency, not having so many ups and downs,” she said.

Svitolina was unable to trouble the 2022 Wimbledon champion.

“I missed my chance, but she’s a great player. It’s always tricky because you feel like you’re so close, but at the same time so far,” the 29-year-old said.

Rybakina withdrew from the French Open in 2023 before her third-round match because of illness.

This season, after winning titles in Brisbane, Abu Dhabi and Stuttgart, Rybakina pulled out of the Italian Open due to health issues.

Rybakina is the only player to beat Iga Swiatek on clay this year, defeating the world No. 1 and three-time French Open champion on her way to the Stuttgart title in April.

Later, Aryna Sabalenka powered into a seventh consecutive Grand Slam quarter-final with an impressive 6-2, 6-3 victory over American 22nd seed Emma Navarro in 69 minutes.

Two-time Australian Open champion Sabalenka belted 36 winners past an overmatched Navarro to avenge her defeat by the 23-year-old at Indian Wells in March.

The second seed, a semi-finalist in Paris in 2023, will take on Mirra Andreeva for a place in the last four. The 17-year-old Russian ousted France’s Varvara Gracheva.

“It sounds crazy to me, to be honest, and I’m super happy that I was able to bring this consistency on the Grand Slams,” said Sabalenka.

“That’s really amazing. I just, yeah, it’s motivating me a lot to keep pushing myself a lot and to see where is the limit.”

Her victory over Navarro means the top five women’s seeds are through to the last eight at Roland Garros for only the third time in three decades. The other two occasions were in 1996 and 2013.
REUTERS, AFP