Top seed Holger Rune beat Alexander Schevchenko 6-4 5-7 6-3 after 2 hours and 28 minutes to reach the quarter finals at the Brisbane International. Rune won 75% of his first serve. The Danish player beat Max Purcell in three sets in his opening match at this tournament.
Rune set up a quarter final against Australian qualifier James Duckworth, who came back from one set down to beat Yannick Hanfmann 4-6 6-1 7-6 (7-2) in 2 hours and 27 minutes reaching his first tour-level quarter final since San Diego in 2022. Duckworth saved two match points at 4-5 in the third set.
Schechenko saved two break points in the third game to take a 2-1 lead at deuce. Rune broke serve in the seventh game to take a 4-3 lead. Schevchenko broke serve in the 12th game to take the second set 7-5. Rune broke twice in the first and third games and saved a break point at 5-2 to seal the third set 6-2 on his first match point.
Last year’s Wimbledon champion Roman Safiuliun came back from one set down to beat Alexei Popyrin 6-7 (9-11) 6-4 7-6 (7-3) in 2 hours and 56 minutes.
Both players went on serve in the first set en route to the tie-break. Safiulin went up a mini-break twice, but Popyrin pulled back on serve each time to draw level to 6-6. Popyrin claimed the first set 11-9 in the tie-break after saving four set points. The Australian player was broken in the first game of the second set before taking a medical time-out while he was trailing 1-2. Safiulin held on his next service games to win the second set 6-4. Popyrin broke Safiulin’s serve in the fourth game of the third set to take a 3-1 lead.
Safiulin came back from 1-4 down before saving five match points across two service games to reach his ATP Tour level quarter final and fourth on hard court. Safiuli, who beat Ben Shelton in the first round, won 81% of his first serve points and saved 13 of the 14 break points he faced.
Popyrin set up a quarter final match against Matteo Arnaldi, who beat Lukas Klein 6-4 3-6 7-5.
Kotov earned his first break to 30 in the second game to open up a 3-0 lead. Arnaldi won five consecutive games with two breaks of serve to take a 5-3 lead and served out the first set 6-4 on his first set point after 42 minutes.
Kotov broke serve in the fourth game to take a 3-1 lead. The Slovakian player held on his serve in the next games to close out the second set 6-3 on his second set point after 35 minutes.
Both players held on his serve until the 12th game in the third set, when Arnaldi broke serve on his third match point after 48 minutes.
Ugo Humbert beat US qualifier Alex Michelsen 6-4 6-4 with a break in the first game of each set to earn his first win of the season in 1 hour and 37 minutes. Humbert will face either Rafael Nadal or Jason Kubler.