World Number 18 Bernard Tomic battled past Richard Gasquet with 6-3 6-7 (1-7) 6-4 in the best match of the week so far at the Shanghai Rolex Master. The Australian player beat Gasquet only once in their previous eight head-to-head matches in a hard-fought match at Wimbledon 2013 in four sets with 7-6 5-7 7-5 7-6 but since then the Frenchman has always prevailed over the young Aussie. The Frenchman won their previous head-to-head match at this year’s US Open in straight sets with 6-4 6-3 6-1.
The first set was decided in the eight game when Gasquet went down 0-40 but he saved the first two break points. Tomic converted on the only break point chance of the first set at the third opportunity to seal the win with 6-4.
A very tight second set featured a hard-fought third game. Tomic did not convert his break point chances in the third and in the eleventh games. The set came down to the tie-break where Gasquet prevailed with 7-1 to force the match to the third set.
In the ninth game of a highly-entertaining third set Gasquet earned his first two break points of the match. Tomic held his serve before sealing the win on the third match point after a hard.fought 13-minute final game . Tomic has reached his second Master 1000 quarter final. He will face Novak Djokovic in a re-match of the 2011 Wimbledon quarter final won by the Serbian player.
