New York, Sep 8 : Frances Tiafoe whipped the crowd at home into a frenzy after she defeated the ninth seed Russian Andrey Rublev 7-6(3), 7-6(0), 6-4 and becoming the first American to make it to the semifinals of the US Open men’s singles semifinals since 2006.The 24 year old No.22 seed continued to show his great form on Wednesday when he defeated the 22-time Grand Slam champion, Rafael Nadal, in the fourth round.
“This is crazy.This is insane.It was the most significant victory in my life only 24 hours ago [and] then coming back and take it all back,” Tiafoe said.”It’s incredible growth.It’s hard to get the book to the next page.”
Tiafoe’s debut career Grand Slam semifinal will come on Friday when he will face 19-year-old Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz, who played a marathon match that lasted for more than five hours to defeat the Italian Jannik Sinner 6-3 6-7(7), 6-7(0) 7-5 7-5, in five sets.
World No.1 Iga Swiatek of Poland made it to her first US Open semifinals after eliminating No.8 Jessica Pegula, the last American remaining in the singles for women 7-6, 7-6(4).The second set was back-andforth and saw the two players combining 10 breaks in the 12 games.
“I’m very happy that I’m striving to keep my expectations down since today was an intense game,” Swiatek said.Swiatek.”The level was excellent and I’m very satisfied with how I played it.”
The 21-year-old will then play Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus in the semifinals following the sixth seed’s 6-1 7-6(4) defeat of the 2016 US Open runner-up Karolina Pliskova earlier on Wednesday.
China’s Zhang Shuai and Mate Pavic of Croatia were awed by Belgians Kirsten Flipkens as well as Edouard Roger-Vasselin of France 7-5, 6-4 10-6 in the mixed doubles semifinals.
All Chinese players have bowed out of this year’s US Open, yet many of them have had the best performances of their career.The 33-year-old Zhang reached the final 16 in the women’s singles tournament for the first time, after beating Canadian Rebecca Marino in straight sets.
Yuan Yue, Zheng Qinwen and Wang Xiyu all advanced to the final 32 of women’s singles and Wu Yibing also reached the third round in the singles for men, a further record for Chinese players.
BSK
