Juan Martín del Potro has reached the quarter-finals of Wimbledon after a hard fight against Gilles Simon. The Argentinean had to work an extra shift because of dusk.
The “Tower of Tandil” is still there. Juan Martín del Potro met the experienced and witty Frenchman Gilles Simon in the round of 16 in Wimbledon – and it became the expected unpleasant task for del Potro.
Already in the first run it indicated that Simon was in great shape and acted with his usual calm and a lot of slice. The flat forehand of the experienced player always causes del Potro problems. Simon moved smoothly on the Holy Lawn and forced his opponent onto the defensive again and again.
“DelPo” responded with crashing serves and forced a tiebreak. The serve giant clearly won the match with 7:1.
Simon defused the Argentinian’s mighty forehands well in the second round as well and kept himself in the match with a clever game. The logical consequence was another decision by the tiebreak. It became much narrower and del Potro had to go to its physical limits.
Once again, the mental strength of the “gentle giant” paid off and the favourite took a 2-0 lead in the sets with a 7-5 tie-break.
Simon was not discouraged by the two tight sets and saw his chance of a comeback. Late on Monday evening, the two tennis tamers fought a great fight in which Simon played his way back into the match with a break and a hard-fought 7:5 in the third set.
Due to the onset of darkness, the match could not be finished on the planned Monday and so the decision was postponed to Tuesday. However, the match did not lose drama and the level increased once again.
Del Potro already served to win the match at 5:4, missed four match points before Simon used his fourth break point for 5:5. Also the fourth heat was decided in the tiebreak – again with the better end for del Potro.
With a heartbeat final, del Potro made the decisive stroke for 7-5 in the tiebreak and catapulted himself into the quarter-finals, where he will meet world number one Rafael Nadal.