Thiem Cruises Into Second Week At Roland Garros
Thiem Cruises Into Second Week At Roland Garros
Austrian defeats Zeballos on Sunday
Sixth seed Dominic Thiem wasted no time getting down to business on Sunday at Roland Garros, requiring just one hour and 39 minutes to book his spot in the quarter-finals over Horacio Zeballos 6-1, 6-3, 6-1.
Thiem picked up his 33rd match win of the season, second only to Rafael Nadal (39). The victory also marks the first time he has reached a Grand Slam quarter-final without dropping a set.
The Austrian continues to excel on clay this season, winning in Rio de Janeiro (d. Carreno Busta) and finishing runner-up at the Mutua Madrid Open and Barcelona Open Banc Sabadell (both l. to Nadal). Thiem is the only player to defeat Nadal on clay this year, ousting the Spaniard in the Internazionali BNL d’Italia quarter-finals.
Next up for Thiem is second seed Novak Djokovic or 19th seed Albert Ramos-Vinolas. Thiem is even in his FedEx ATP Head2Head with Ramos-Vinolas at 1-1 and won their most recent match this February in Rio de Janeiro.
However, He trails Djokovic in their FedEx ATP Head2Head 0-5 and has won just eight games in the five sets they’ve contested on clay. The Serbian defeated Thiem in last year’s Roland Garros semi-finals and handed him one of the most lopsided losses of his career last month, cruising to a 6-1, 6-0 win in the Rome semi-finals.
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The sixth seed only lost three points on his first serve (35/38) against Zeballos and broke the Argentine seven times. Thiem finished the day with 24 winners to 17 unforced errors, firing an ace on his first match point to wrap up the contest.
Go inside the tournament at RolandGarros.com