US Open Day 9 - Monfils Keeps French Hopes Alive

Gael Monfils is one of the many French tennis players attempting to following in the footsteps of national hero Yannick Noah and become his country’s first male Grand Slam singles champion for over 20 years

Monfils celebrates his fourth round win  

At 28 Monfils remains the only one of the thirteen male French players who started this year’s US Open just over a week ago, the highest number of representatives along with Spain. Now he will prepare for a quarter-final with the great Roger Federer with a chance to define his intermittent career.

The most impressive thing about Monfils’ fourth round victory over this year’s breakthrough act Grigor Dimitrov wasn’t his astonishing speed or his sensational shot making instead it the way he kept a lid on his fiery emotions which have a tendency to explode at any given moment.  

It was a defining win for Monfils and following his quarter-final showing at the French Open it means that he has reached the last eight of two slams in the same year for the first time in his career. The Frenchman edged three tight sets in a close encounter but was ultimately more consistent at the key moments of the match which he came through 7-5 7-6(6) 7-5 in 2 hours and 24 minutes. 

For Dimitrov it was something of an anti-climax to what has been an excellent 2014 break through, especially in the slams. However on this occasion the 23 year old Bulgarian was unable to reproduce the same quality which saw him make an incredible run to the Wimbledon semi-final, as too many errors at the crucial stages denied him a dream last eight clash against Federer.

The first set was dominated by both players serves, the first and only break point fell the way of the Frenchman in the eleventh game with the pair locked at 5-5, he confidently took it before serving out the set.

Monfils broke the Dimitrov serve again at the start of the second set but when the Bulgarian quickly struck back the Frenchman came close to collapsing into an almighty meltdown. He quarrelled with umpire Jack Garner over a point he felt should have been stopped when a piece of litter blew onto court.

However Dimitrov couldn’t close in on the advantage which had been presented to him and despite leading 6-4 with two set points in the tie break, crucial mistakes cost him and Monfils snuck in to steal the set and take a commanding lead.

Dimitrov may have looked the fresher of the two, with Monfils appearing to gasp for air on numerous occasions. However the Frenchman’s serve remained resolute and at 6-5 in the third set he pounced again to knockout the 7^th seed Bulgarian and advance to the last eight.

That’s where he’ll meet the 2^nd seed Federer after the Swiss beat Roberto Bautista Agut 6-4 6-3 6-2, Tomas Berdych and Marin Cilic also progressed. In the women’s draw Caroline Wozniacki set up a semi-final with Shuai Peng after both won in straight sets.