The American Dream: how Russians continue to fight at the Cincinnati Masters
Russian tennis player Karen Khachanov stepped into the fourth round of the Cincinnati Masters without any extra nerves and at the same time returned to the top 10 in the online ATP rankings. In a hot and stuffy tournament in the USA, our 29-year-old athlete dealt with the 101st racket of the world and the idol of local fans, Jenson Brooksby, in an hour and a half, continuing a series of successful performances that has been going on for two and a half months. Andrey Rublev also reached the 1/8 finals, and it took him more than three hours to deal with Australian Alexei Popyrin.
Zverev again
Before the match in Cincinnati, Khachanov called Brooksby a very uncomfortable opponent, recalling his defeat in Indian Wells in 2022. (0:6, 3:6). In addition, after the final in Toronto, Karen had difficulty acclimating to the hot Ohio. The stuffiness and high temperature of the air at this Masters have already led to fainting on the court. And the day before, the rain also aggravated everything. Because of him, Karen did not immediately find out the name of the next opponent. The night match between Alexander Zverev and Brandon Nakashima was interrupted at the most interesting moment — when the German tennis player had to serve for the match with the score 6:4, 5:4. Later, Zverev ended the match with a victory. In general, there were a lot of concerns about the psychological and physical condition of our most stable player at the moment, and it's good that they weren't justified.
Karen created the main point reserve at the end of the first and the beginning of the second game, and then just confidently held the advantage. In one of the draws, Khachanov caught such courage that he performed a successful tweener (a backhand between the legs, standing with his back to his opponent) — Brooksby hit back, but a second later, upset, sent the ball into the net. Overall, the Russian made only two aces during the match, did not make a single double mistake and made four break points out of seven. His opponent served one straight serve, made one double fault and won one break ball out of three. The key statistical point was that Karen made significantly fewer unforced errors — 19 versus 36 for Jenson.
Thus, Khachanov won his 15th victory after Roland Garros with four defeats. He has won the semi—finals in Halle, the quarter-finals at Wimbledon and the final in Toronto. Perhaps this is the most successful period in recent years in the career of an athlete who showed great promise in the past, but then faded into the shadows due to injuries and stability problems. Many of our fans are used to considering Karen the third number in the "Russian three", where Daniil Medvedev and Andrey Rublev were constantly in the lead roles. Meanwhile, Khachanov is already confidently the first racket of Russia in the online ranking, and after defeating Brooksby, he achieved his cherished goal - he stepped into the top 10 of the live rating.
Karen's next opponent will be world number three Alexander Zverev. The Russian beat the German representative in the semifinals of the previous Masters, but the courts in Cincinnati are slower, which is good for the German. Khachanov lost to Zverev in this tournament last year.
Passed the test
Under certain circumstances, Holger Rune, Francis Tiafoe and Andrei Rublev may oust Karen from the top ten in the coming days. The latter was putting the squeeze on Alexey Popyrin in the hardest match of the third round. The fate of the first and second sets was decided in a tiebreak. The Australian got the first one, and the Russian got the second one with the same score of 7:5.
With the score 2-1 in favor of Rublev in the deciding set, the match was interrupted due to rain. The game resumed after 50 minutes. It was felt that the pause was more beneficial to Rublev. He outplayed Popyrin in longer draws and got a great opportunity to win the match. With the score 4-3, Andrey earned two break points, but Alexey was still able to defend his serve. And then the Australian won back from 40:0 and also had his chance to take the lead at the end of the decisive set. In this game of nerves, someone had to give in, and in the end, the Russian put the squeeze on his opponent.
In the 12th game, he converted a matchball from his eighth break point and broke a series of defeats from Popyrin (the score in the personal confrontation was 2:2). Rublev reached the 1/8 finals of the Masters for the second time in a row and the third time this season. To reach the quarterfinals in Cincinnati, you will need to take another revenge — from Francisco Comesanya, to whom Rublev lost a year ago at Wimbledon. The Argentine, in turn, played three matchballs against Riley Opelka and for the first time in his career will play in the 1/8 finals of the "thousandth".
— The main thing is that, having lost a set in such heat, I did not give up, turned myself around, continued to fight and was able to win such a difficult and healthy match 7:6, 7:5 — this was a very big test for me, which I was able to pass, and I am very happy with it. Next, play with a team. It's an amazing grid, a rematch tournament of some kind. Therefore, of course, then I would like to have another rematch. We'll see, I'll do my best. Come what may (smiles)," Rublev said in a comment for "More!".
Ekaterina Alexandrova and Anna Kalinskaya advanced to the fourth round at the women's thousandth in Cincinnati, beating top-10 representative Amanda Anisimova from the United States. Ekaterina and Anna will face each other in the 1/8 finals, so one Russian woman will definitely be in the quarterfinals. Veronika Kudermetova also continues to fight for the trophy. In the third round, the Wimbledon doubles champion will face Klara Towson, their match was postponed due to rain.
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