Andrey Rublev battled past Alex De Minaur 6-4 6-7 (5-7) 6-7 (4-7) 6-3 6-0 in a rollercoaster five-set fourth round match to reach the quarter final at the Australian Open on Rod Laver Arena in Melbourne for the third time. Rublev has advanced to the 10th Grand Slam quarter of his career.
Rublev reached the 10th Grand Slam quarter final of his career. He scored the 300th ATP Tour match of his career becoming the fourth man born in 1995 or later to achieve this feat after Alexander Zverev, Danil Medvedev and Stefanos Tsitsipas.
Rublev earned the first break of the match in the fourth game to take a 3-1 lead. De Minaur broke back in the seventh game at love and held serve to draw level to draw level to 4-4. Rublev broke again on his second set point to win the first set 6-4. Both players held serve in a close battle in the second set en route to the tie-break. De Minaur earned two set points at 6-4 in the tie-break. Rublev saved the first set point but De Minaur converted his second chance.
De Minaur held an early break in the second game of the third set, but Rublev broke back in the ninth game. Both players held their next service games en route to the tie-break, which started with four consecutive mini-breaks. De Minaur earned two mini-breaks to take a 2-1 lead, but Rublev pulled back on serve to draw level to 2-2. De Minaur won five of the next six points including two mini-breaks to win the tie-break 7-4.
Rublev broke in the second game with a crosscourt backhand to open up a 3-0 lead in the fourth set. De Minaur pulled the break back to reduce the deficit to 2-3, but Rublev broke for the second time in the sixth game to take a 4-2 lead. De Minaur earned one last chance to pull back the break, but Rublev fended it off before serving out at love to win the fourth set 6-3.
Rublev won nine of the last ten games from 2-3 down in the fourth set, including the last seven games in a row to seal a hard-fought match after 4 hours and 14 minutes. Rublev saved three break points in the final game before closing out the win on his second match point.
Rublev set up a quarter final match against Jannik Sinner, who beat Karen Khachanov 6-4 7-5 6-3. Sinner leads 4-2 in in his six head-to-head matches against Rublev.
“First of all I want to say amazing match to Alex. Two days ago I said I hope we are going to show a great match and the spectators will enjoy it, but now I regret about it because I did not expect that it will be that enjoyable. When I losing two sets to one down, I don’t know. I think I broke him in the beginning and then he broke me back, and then I start to tell to myself: ‘No, you are going to die today, but you will do everything’. Somehow I start to play better and better and I found more energy, and I was able to win”, said Rublev.
