Alex de Minaur is celebrating an impressive comeback.
The 24-year-old Uruguayan & Spanish Australian professional tennis player completed a stunning first-set comeback at the Canadian Open en route to a 7-6(7), 4-6, 6-1 victory against American Taylor Fritz.
With his win, de Minaur has reached the quarterfinals at an ATP Masters 1000 event for the first time in his young career.
de Minaur trailed 1-5 in the first set against Fritz, who squandered two set points on serve. The Australian eventually sealed the opener on his sixth set point and took advantage of some loose hitting from Fritz in the third set to advance after two hours and 28 minutes.
Fritz is ninth in the ATP Live Race To Turin and was hoping to boost his chances of qualifying for the Nitto ATP Finals with a deep run in Toronto. However, he struggled to find consistency against de Minaur, committing 55 unforced errors.
”It feels great to finally break that barrier,” de Minaur said when asked about reaching the last eight at a Masters 1000 event for the first time.
“It’s just a never-say-die attitude. It doesn’t matter what the score is. I’m always going to fight till the end. Being able to compete and stay positive got me into the match. I knew even if I lost that set I’d be in the match and playing a lot better.”
Earlier this year the 24-year-old captured the biggest title of his career at the ATP 500 in Acapulco. He has now won six of his past seven matches, after advancing to the title match in Los Cabos last week (l. to Stefanos Tsitsipas).
He will next fight Daniil Medvedev in the quarterfinals.