The Round 4 bottom half of the draw matchups are set. Novak Djokovic will take on Diego Schwartzman and will be looking to backup an incredible performance to beat Yoshihto Nishioka on Friday. Roger Federer was given a very tough time in a four-set win against John Millman. The Swiss will take on Marton Fucsovics in a rematch from Round 4 two years ago.
Australian Open Day 5 Men’s Recap
Who should be proud of themselves
Tennys Sandgren has a reputation for randomly peaking out of nowhere – and he’s certainly mastered the skill of doing so, reaching his third Grand Slam fourth round in the past nine majors. The 2018 quarterfinalist here had a nearly flawless performance to beat fellow American Sam Querrey. Sandgren broke his big-serving opponent five times to take the match 6-4 6-4 6-4.
There were better and worse moments, but Marin Cilic was definitely the better player in his win over Roberto Bautista Agut. The Croat took the match 6-3 in the fifth and won 11 games in a row at one point. He was particularly impressive in the third set, which he won six games to love, dropping just five points in total.
It was a first really brilliant performance from Novak Djokovic at this year’s Australian Open. The Serbian pulled off some crazy service numbers, losing just eight points on serve in total (four of them in the last game, where he faced his only break point of the match). Yoshihito Nishioka was left clueless and never really threatened the Serbian.
Flops
Tough to say whether it was Stefanos Tsitsipas who disappointed or Milos Raonic who was just absolutely stunning. Raonic won a surprisingly huge amount of baseline rallies and hit 55 winners to just 23 from the Greek. The sixth seed couldn’t fathom a single breakpoint as the Canadian absolutely dominated the play in a comfortable straight-set victory.
Tommy Paul didn’t manage to regenerate in time for his third round encounter against Marton Fucsovics. The American was knackered after winning a marathon five-setter over Grigor Dimitrov and couldn’t do any damage to a player as solid as the Hungarian. Paul committed 42 unforced errors and failed to convert all four break point opportunities.
Match of the day
It all came down to the last match of the day. John Millman was admirably confident that he could beat the no.3 seed Roger Federer. Millman did very well to lure the Swiss into playing on his terms. It’s not the first time the Australian pushed Federer to the brink – he famously beat him in overwhelming humidity at the 2018 US Open and made the 20-time Grand Slam champion struggle in Brisbane and Halle.
The result was still unknown after almost four hours of play. It all came down to the deciding tie-break, one game up to ten points. Millman seemed good to go with an 8-4 lead but a couple of loose errors let Federer back into the game. The Swiss committed 82 unforced errors in the whole contest himself but was as focused as ever when it mattered. Six points later, it was game, set and match Federer after Millman pushed him wide to the forehand and the Swiss was able to find the open court.
Australian Open Day 5 Photo via Getty Images
