Nadal survives Auger-Aliassime in five to join Djokovic and Alcaraz in French Open quarterfinals

By Ricky Dimon

The completely loaded prime half of the French Open draw stays intact heading into the enterprise finish of the event.

However it wasn’t simple–at the very least not for Rafael Nadal.

The 13-time champion wanted 5 units to get previous Felix Auger-Aliassime within the fourth spherical on Sunday, surviving 3-6, 6-3, 6-2, 3-6, 6-3 after 4 hours and 21 minutes. With that Nadal joined Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz within the quarterfinals; each Djokovic and Alcaraz cruised by means of their matches in simple straight units.

Nadal, Djokovic, and Alcaraz are the highest three favorites for the lads’s singles titles and all three are on the identical aspect of the bracket. That, in fact, means just one can attain the ultimate–and solely two can attain the semis. Nadal and Djokovic need to go head-to-head within the quarters, whereas Alcaraz will face Alexander Zverev on Tuesday.

A five-set wrestle might not be superb preparation for Nadal, however given what Auger-Aliassime threw at him he’ll gladly take any sort of win and stay to see one other day on the terre battue of Roland Garros. Auger-Aliassime fired 50 winners–a outstanding quantity towards Nadal on clay–and served at 69 p.c whereas committing simply 5 unforced errors in your entire fifth set. Sadly for the ninth-ranked Canadian, Nadal additionally raised his degree within the decider and struck 15 winners in comparison with solely 4 errors over the ultimate 9 video games.

“(What) made the distinction (is) that I performed a bit bit higher,” the 35-year-old defined. “The game is often quite simple, no? If you play higher you’ve gotten higher probabilities; should you play worse then you’ve gotten, in fact, much less probabilities.

“In that case, after I performed effectively I received the match. Once I performed not that effectively, I had plenty of troubles. As a result of (within the) first set I didn’t play effectively, so I misplaced. After which after the set, after the primary set and a half I began to play significantly better in my view–far more aggressive. Then I performed an excellent finish of the second set and I feel an excellent third set. Then I made (a) tremendous (massive) mistake in the beginning of the fourth…after which I suffered. However (the) most vital factor (is) that I performed I feel an excellent fifth set.”

Good? Extra like nice.

And the King of Clay must be nice once more if he desires to avenge final yr’s French Open semifinal loss to Djokovic. By way of 4 rounds, Djokovic has not dropped a single set and just one set has been extra aggressive than 6-3. On Sunday he erased Diego Schwartzman 6-1, 6-3, 6-3.

Djokovic is well-rested. Nadal is battle-tested. Which issue is extra vital? We’ll discover out on Tuesday.

Ricky contributes to 10sballs.com and in addition maintains his personal tennis web site, The Grandstand. You may observe him on twitter at @Dimonator.