Flushing Meadows, NY—In a match-up between power and speed on Wednesday evening in the US Oprn quarter-finals, power prevailed with the victory.
Dominic Thiem made history on Wednesday night in Arthur Ashe Stadium by beating 21st seed Alex de Minaur, 6-1, 6-2, 6-4, to become the first Austrian ever to reach the semifinals of the US Open.
“I had a great feeling from the first moment on,” said Thiem, who will face 2019 US Open finalist Daniil Medvedev.
“There is no Roger, Rafa, Novak, but there is Daniil, Sascha and Pablo now,” he said. “There are three other amazing players. Every single one of us deserves this first major title. Everybody will give it all. Once we step on the court, those other three are forgotten anyway.”
De Minaur is known for his quickness on the court, but he played an aggressive match. De Minaur tried returning Thiem’s serve inside the court and rushing the net to put pressure on the Austrian and push him back. That game plan just didn’t work. The 21st seed won 18 of his 28 net points, but was only able to win 49% of points behind his first serve.
Both players had to get over some nerves, with four of the first six games resulting in service breaks. Thiem came back from a 0/40 deficit to hold serve for 4-1 in the opening set and he gathered himself the rest of the way.
The rain forced a roof closure, Thiem broke for 3-1 and 5-1, subsequently serving out the opening set at the 40-minute mark.
The stats were in Thiem’s favor. He won 83 percent (43 of 52) of his first-serve points, and charted 11 aces, 43 winners, and 31 unforced errors in the two-hour-and-four-minute match.
“I had a great feeling from the first moment on, actually,” Thiem said on court after his two-hour, four-minute victory. “It looks way easier on the scoresheet than it was.”
De Minaur try to gain some momentum, but lost serve twice in the second set by double faulting. The Aussie got frustrated and ultimately effected his game, he struggled to find a way to throw Thiem off his game. De Minaur fought hard throughout the entire match, shouting, ‘Come on!’ whenever he won a good rally or smashed an winner.
A third break secured Thiem the set before concerning cracks appeared in De Minaur’s armour. At 2-2 at 40-0 up in the second set, he dropped serve with two double-faults, then coughed up another double to slump behind 5-2. No way out of that hole, De Minaur conceded six successive games as Thiem seized total command.
“Third set I lost a little bit the momentum, the energy and he came back great,” Thiem said. “It was a crucial game at 3-4. Broke him with a really game for 5-4 and then served out almost perfectly.”
De Minaur is projected to rise one spot in the rankings to world No 27 after bettering his career-best grand slam run by one round in New York.
“Obviously the way I’m feeling now, it’s just disappointing with the way my US Open campaign has finished,” De Minaur said. “I would have loved to put more of a fight. He played at a very high level and I wasn’t able to lift mine up to meet his. Still got lots of, lots of things to work on. I guess that’s an upside. It’s a step, a learning curve. I wish I could just all of a sudden flick the switch and start winning slams. It’s a slow process.”
MATCH POINT: Thiem led the ATP Tour with 211 wins between 2016 and 2019, qualifying for the ATP Finals each year. He defeated Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic en route to 2019 ATP Finals championship match.
