Andrey Rublev finds key to resilience during five set battle

James Richardson 21 Jan 2024 5:24 PM

Andrey Rublev gestures to the heavens.

Andrey Rublev secured what might be a watershed victory as he fought back to take a five set battle with last home hope Alex de Minaur in the Australian Open fourth round.

Rublev reached his tenth Grand Slam quarter-final with the epic win and will be hoping top reach the last four at a Major for the first time in his career when he faces Jannik Sinner.

When De Minaur won the third-set tiebreak, it appeared like he would advance to his first Australian Open quarterfinal, but Rublev remained composed enough to complete a fine win.

Rublev had to have a stern word with himself to prevent the kind of downward mental spirals that have frequently plagued his career.

Trailing two sets to one, the world No 5 refused to panic, snatching an early break in the fourth and fifth sets to quiet the rowdy Australian crowd and regain momentum.

Rublev seemed to be flagging physically in the last embers, but he would find something extra to prove unstoppable, ripping 42 winers by the time the two shook hands across the net.

Rublev fortified himself and swung harder after losing the third-set tiebreak and De Minaur eventually couldn’t live with the heavy bombardment from the baseline.

“I started to say to myself ‘No, you’re gonna die today but you will do everything’,” Rublev told the crowd in his on-court comments after the match.

“Somehow I started to play better and better and I found more energy and I was able to win.

“We’ve played a couple of times and all of them were dramatic like now. He’s one of the fastest players, the way he moves with the legs and he takes the speed, it’s crazy.

“When you play four hours, long rallies and you try to stretch … I start to feel a bit of pain but it’s normal after four hours with intensity like this. I was just trying not to think about it, just trying to push myself to do everything I could.

“Don’t cry, don’t start to feel sorry for yourself … just keep fighting and we’ll see what’s going to happen.”

Rublev wasn’t terribly keen to lift the lid on his mindset during the match, saying that it was like a horror movie inside his head.

“Better not to be inside my head at this time,” Rublev replied laughing. “It’s like a scary movie.”

“I started to say to myself ‘No, you’re gonna die today but you will do everything’.”