On Wednesday, twenty-two-time grand slam champion Rafael Nadal outlasted eleventh seed Taylor Fritz, 3-6 7-5 3-6 7-5 7-6 (10-4) in a five-set thriller on Centre Court at Wimbledon. The Spaniard took the first set 6-3 with a break of serve early in the game, but Fritz responded and reeled off five successive games to take the first set 6-3. With Fritz up 4-3 in the second set, a trainer was called onto the court to evaluate the two-time Wimbledon champ. He eventually used a medical timeout and left the court for treatment. Despite those difficulties, Nadal roared back to win the second as he broke in the final game to win 7-5, tying the affair at one set each.
After winning the third set 6-3, Fritz was on the brink of victory by taking a 5-4 lead in the fourth set, with Nadal serving to extend the match. Nadal did just that, winning the next three games to force a decisive fifth set. In the fifth set both players found themselves tied 4-4 before Fritz again found his way to a 5-4 lead and served for victory. As he famously has done time and time again, the Spaniard grinded out another game to draw level at 5-5 each and eventually forced a tiebreak for the match. From there Nadal cruised past Fritz, jumping out to a 5-0 lead before going on to win the tiebreak 10-4. “The body in general fine,” said Nadal in his postgame interview, “of course in the abdominal something is not going well … I had to find a way to serve a little bit different.”
The Spanish tennis player Rafael Nadal won his eighth-round match at Wimbledon on Wednesday, becoming the third man in the Open Era to reach the Wimbledon singles semifinals aged 36 or older. Nadalwas forced to withdraw from the tournament in 2021 due to fatigue, and is bidding for a record-extending 23rd men’s singles grand slam title and third at the All England Lawn Tennis Club. In the other men’s quarterfinal match on Wednesday, Australian Nick Kyrgios defeated Chilean CristianGarin in straight sets, 6-4 6-3 7-6 (7-5) to reach a semifinal at a grand slam for the first time in his career. The 27-year-old also becomes the first male Australian player to reach the Wimbledon semifinal in 17 years.
Kyrgios said after the match, “I just thought I’d never be at a semifinal of a grand slam. Honestly, I thought my ship had sailed. Obviously, I didn’t go about things great earlier in my career and may have wasted that little window but you know, (I’m) just really proud of the way that I’ve just come back out here and with my team just to be able to put on a performance.”