Jan-Lennard Struff broke new ground early Tuesday afternoon when the 30-year-old booked a spot in his first ATP Masters 1000 quarter-final. The World No. 34 closed out a 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 victory over 2019 finalist David Goffin to reach the last eight of the Western & Southern Open.
“It was a tough one, very close one again. The conditions were very hot again. Yesterday I thought it was a bit worse, the conditions, but David is a very tough player,” said Struff, who narrowed his ATP Head2Head deficit against the Belgian to 2-3. “I had some chances, he had some chances… the last game was really good.”
The German powered past the seventh seed in two hours and nine minutes with a devastating final game of all-out attack. Struff hit 35 winners, including a bludgeoned forehand return on his first match point. It is the World No. 34’s eighth Top 10 victory, with six of those coming since the start of last season. He has won seven of his past 15 matches against the elite group.
”I played some good tennis early on [against Top 10 players] as well, but I lost the matches most of the time,” Struff said. “That gave me a bit of experience how it is to be on court with them… I played good tennis [today] and I’m very happy to get another Top 10 win.”
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Struff will next face World No. 1 Novak Djokovic or Tennys Sandgren. Djokovic leads Sandgren 2-0 in their ATP Head2Head series.
”I think the chances are higher to play Novak, but I don’t want to take anything away from Sandgren at the moment. I will prepare for the match,” Struff said. “If I will play Novak, it will be very nice. I played him at the Australian Open, which was a very good match, I think, a very good match for me… I would love to play him again.”
from Tennis - ATP World Tour https://ift.tt/3b07vRB
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