Garin beats de Minaur in stunning comeback to seal quarter-final spot
Chile’s Christian Garin produces stunning comeback to shock Alex de Minaur and seal Wimbledon quarter-final spot… as the Australian admits he’ll ‘try to forget about’ throwing away two set lead in five-hour epic
- Chile’s Christian Garin produced a stunning comeback to shock Alex de Minaur
- Garin recovered a two set deficit to qualify for Wimbledon’s quarter-finals
- The 23-year-old de Minaur missed two match points opportunities on the day
- The world No. 43 will now face Nick Kyrgios in the next round of the tournament
Alex de Minaur thought about snapping his racket over his leg. He feigned to smash it into the floor. In the end, though, the Australian snuck off Court 2 without a scene before mumbling about opportunities missed and lessons to learn.
You wonder, had his own five-set tussle gone the other way, whether Nick Kyrgios would have gone quite so quietly.
Instead the Australian will now face Cristian Garin in the last eight after Chile’s world No 43 produced an astonishing comeback to down De Minaur and secure a first Grand Slam quarter-final.
Chile’s Christian Garin produced a stunning comeback to shock Alex de Minaur on Court 2
The world No. 43 overcame a two set deficit to qualify for the quarter-final of Wimbledon
De Minaur (pictured) had two match point opportunities but failed to take advantage of them
This was some four-and-a-half-hour tussle. It has been some week for Garin, who confessed to being ‘upset’ when drawn against No 8 seed Matteo Berrettini.
The Italian’s bout with Covid cleared a path for the 26-year-old and yesterday frustration gave way to opportunity once more.
De Minaur looked destined for a first Wimbledon quarter final – and an all-Australian clash with Kyrgios – when he moved two sets clear. The 23-year-old even had two match points.
But Garin clung on and, roared on by a dash of home support, launched a brilliant fightback to become only the fourth Chilean man in history to reach the Wimbledon last eight.
Not bad for a country without any grass courts.
Garin becomes only the fourth Chilean man in history to reach the Wimbledon last eight
The 26-year-old will face another Australian, Nick Kyrgios, in the next round of the competition
‘To be in the quarterfinals here is a dream. I will try to enjoy it,’ Garin said. ‘Wimbledon, I said this many times, is my favourite tournament. Every time that I play this tournament is something special I feel.’
He added: ‘The first two sets I start a bit slow, and he was more aggressive than me… after the second set, I said: “I need to change, I need to go for it.” That’s what I did.’
There had been riveting action even before then.
These two exchanged five breaks in set two and seven more over the next three. Incredibly, Garin led for only one game – after an early break in the fifth. At 5-4 down in the decider, the Chilean offered up two match points, saved them both and forced De Minaur into a championship tiebreak. Cue more yo-yoing.
Garin secured the first mini-break, De Minaur turned the tide to lead 5-3. Then the Chilean won six straight points to wrestle away a match that, for so long, he had no right to win.
23-year-old de Minaur admits that he’ll try ‘to forget about’ the loss on Monday afternoon
‘It stings,’ De Minaur admitted. ‘I’ll do my best to forget about it, but it’s probably not going to happen.’
Soon Garin will have to turn his attention to facing another Australian. Kyrgios and De Minaur share very little except a passport – there were no histrionics on Court 2. De Minaur is the quiet, scurrying, rather unspectacular type. Kyrgios less so.
‘He is one of the guys that I like to watch, he’s very good for tennis,’ Garin said.
‘I had a long battle, almost five hours. I just want to recover, eat well and rest. Tomorrow with my team we will think about the match… I don’t see it like an opportunity. I just want to enjoy, play my best, and fight every point as I always do.’
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