Australian Open 2022: Marin Cilic Upsets Andrey Rublev To Enter Men’s Singles 4th Round

Former US Open champion Marin Cilic has upset No. 5-seeded Andrey Rublev to reach the fourth round of the Australian Open 2022 men’s singles. (More Tennis News)

The 33-year-old Cilic, who won the 2014 U.S. Open title and was a runner-up to Roger Federer in Australia in 2018, beat Rublev 7-5, 7-6 (3), 3-6, 6-3 in the last match completed on Day 6 of the year’s first Grand Slam tournament.

He went into the encounter with just one win in his previous 15 matches against top 10 players and had lost his previous four head-to-heads against Rublev, but was dominant from the start.

Cilic will next play No. 9 Felix Auger-Aliassime, who won 14 of the last 16 games in his 6-4, 6-1, 6-1 third-round win over No. 24 Dan Evans. Alex de Minaur has advanced to the fourth round of his home Grand Slam event for the first time.

De Minaur, seeded 32nd, beat Pablo Andujar 6-4, 6-4, 6-2 in the first of the night matches on Day 6 on the main show court at Melbourne Park.
De Minaur, a quarterfinalist at the 2020 U.S. Open, will next play No. 11 Jannik Sinner, who beat Japanese qualifier Taro Daniel 6-4, 1-6, 6-3, 6-1 in the third round. Maxime Cressy, another 24-year-old American, is into the fourth round at a major for the first time.

The No. 70-ranked Cressy beat Australian wildcard entry Chris O’Connell 6-2, 6-7 (6), 6-3, 6-2 and will next play U.S. Open champion Daniil Medvedev. No. 9 Felix Auger-Aliassime had a 6-4, 6-1, 6-1 win over No. 24 Dan Evans, winning 14 of the last 16 games after it was 4-4 in the first set.

In the women’s singles, second-seeded Aryna Sabalenka has moved into the fourth round at the Australian Open with a 4-6, 6-3, 6-1 win over No. 31 Marketa Vondrousova. The match started ominously for Sabalenka when she had two double-faults and was broken in the first game.

She’ll next play No. 115-ranked Kaia Kanepi, who beat Australian wild-card entry Maddison Inglis 2-6, 6-2, 6-0. Kanepi has reached the quarterfinals six times at Grand Slam events, but never has reached the last eight at the Australian Open.

Two-time Grand Slam champion Simona Halep is into Week 2 at Melbourne Park for the fifth consecutive year. The 14th-seeded Halep advanced with a 6-2, 6-1 victory over Danka Kovinic, a player who is ranked 98th and eliminated U.S. Open champion Emma Raducanu in the previous round.

This was Kovinic’s first appearance in the third round of a major. None of the other players remaining the women’s draw has won as many tour-level titles as Halep’s 23. Halep’s next opponent will be Alize Cornet, who celebrated her 32nd birthday with a 4-6, 6-4, 6-2 victory over No. 29 Tamara Zidansek, a 2021 French Open semifinalist.