Defending champion Marin Cilic had to bring out his very best to proceed to the quarter finals of the Kremlin Cup. The 27 year old Croat was on court for two hours as he knocked out Denis Istomin 7-6, 3-6, 6-3 to set up a quarter final meeting with Andrey Kuznetsov.
This was Cilic’s sixth win in seven meetings against Uzbekistan’s number one player but the Croat admitted that “in the last few matches against Denis I always experienced problems as his style of play doesn’t suit me. Today it was another very tough match as in the first two sets I didn’t have any break points . In the third set I felt that his game dipped a little and it was enough for me to make the deciding advantage. I feel that I’m not too far from my top form and I hope in the near future I will be able to play much, much better”.
The aforementioned Kuznetsov got revenge for compatriot Rublev by defeating Mikhail Kukushkin, the player born in Russia but playing under the Kazakhstan flag, much to the joy of the Moscovite public. There was another Russian win in the shape of Evgeny Donskoy, who surged past another eastern European, Ricardas Berankis, in straight sets, making it three local players in the quarter finals.
Philipp Kohlschreiber ensured there was no upset as he took out Aslan Karatsev in three sets and Lucas Pouille prolonged Daniel Gimeno’s terrible season with a straight sets win over the Spaniard.
