Mother nature has helped extend Marin Cilic’s presence at the Rio Open as he trails Gael Monfils in the second round.
The Croatian top seed struggled with his first serve on Wednesday. Getting less than 50% of them in. It enabled former US Open semifinalist Monfils to exert his dominance during the opening set by breaking three times to claim the 6-3 lead. It was a much closer encounter in the second as they exchanged breaks. With little disparity between the two, it was the rain that saved Cilic. Trailing 3-6, 6-6(7-7), the match had to be postponed due to bad weather.
Chilie’s Nicolas Jarry managed to beat the rain to secure one of the biggest wins of his career. The 22-year-old stunned fourth seed Albert Ramos 7-5, 6-3, to secure his first win over a top 20 player and a place in his maiden ATP quarter-final. Jarry achieved the milestone with the help of six aces as he won 77% of the points behind his first serve.
“I’m happy to pull it over. I was getting very nervous,” he told atpworldtour.com.
“The last game that I broke him he didn’t have too much energy. I also lowered mine and I didn’t keep my focus on the things I had to do. A couple of big errors almost cost me that second set.
“It’s a tough match, Albert is one of the best clay-court players in the present. He’s a great guy and I’m very happy to be in the quarter-finals.”
Despite his minimal success of the ATP Tour, Jarry claimed a trio of Challenger titles last year. All which occurred on the clay. More recently, he won the doubles crown at the Ecuador Open with compatriot Hans Podlipnik-Castillo. His first ATP title of any kind.
“I’m just doing the same as I did last year – have fun on the court, train as hard as I can, stay very concentrated,” Jarry said.
“Last year I had a great year in Challengers. I didn’t have the ranking to play ATP [events]. Now I have and I’m making the best out of it and I’m very happy for being able to do it.”
In the last eight, the Chilean will play either Pablo Cuevas or Gastao Elias.
Another player moving into the quarter-finals is Argentina’s Diego Schwartzman. The world No.23 required 78 minutes to defeat fellow countryman Federico Delbonis 6-2, 6-3. Schwartzman, who hasn’t won a title since 2016, is just three places adrift from breaking into the top 20 on the ATP Emirates rankings for the first time in his career.
The 25-year-old will take on either Monfils or Cilic next, who will play the remainder of their match on Thursday.
