Spaniard Rafael Nadal, who had won the last three clay tournaments of the ATP Tour (Monte Carlo, Barcelona, Madrid), was eliminated on Friday in the quarterfinals of the Rome Masters 1000 by Austrian Dominic Thiem 6- 4 and 6-3.
Thiem thus avenged bitter losses to Nadal this year. Thiem had earlier in the year lost to Nadal in the finals of the Barcelona and Madrid tournaments.
The young Austrian will now have to wait until Saturday to know his next opponent as the match between Argentine Juan Martin del Potro and Serbian Novak Djokovic was suspended on Friday due to poor weather conditions.
The Serb was 6-1 and 1-2 in the score when the referee decided to stop the actions due the heavy rains that fell on the Italian capital.
Thiem, ranked seventh in the world and semifinalist last year at Roland Garros, found this time the right formula to beat Nadal, who will not be able to get an eighth title in the Roman arena.
Flawless from start to finish, and playing by far his best tennis of the tournament, the 23-year-old Austrian was very aggressive the whole match, using very solid backhanded and right-handed strokes.
Nadal, ranked fourth in the world, thus suffers his first clay defeat of the year as he prepares for Roland Garros, where he aspires to claim his tenth trophy. With this win against “The King of Clay” Thiem sends a strong message to his peers that he is a serious threat to win the French Open title.
On the other hand, American John Isner and German Alexander Zverev will clash in the first semifinal of the tournament after winning their matches against Croatian Marin Cilic and Canadian Milos Raonic, respectively.
It took Isner two and a half hours to defeat the Croatian in three sets (7-6, 2-6 and 7-6); while Zverev beat Raonic in straight sets 7-6 and 6-1 in one hour and 31 minutes.
