For a second consecutive year, Félix Auger-Aliassime will be in the second week of the Australian Open tennis tournament.
The 21-year-old Montrealer, seeded ninth, easily defeated Britain’s Daniel Evans 6-4, 6-1, 6-1 in a third-round match Saturday at Melbourne Park.
In the round of 16 on Monday, Auger-Aliassime will cross swords with Croatian veteran Marin Cilic, ranked 27th. Late Saturday night, Cilic eliminated Andrey Rublev (5th) 7-5, 7-6 (3), 3-6, 6-3.
This will be the fourth duel between Auger-Aliassime and Cilic, and the Croatian has won the first three. Cilic’s most recent victory against the Quebecois dates back to last June, in the final of the Stuttgart tournament, on grass.
It is the fourth time in his last five attempts that Auger-Aliassime has reached the second week of activities of a Grand Slam tournament.
This list includes appearances in the semi-finals at the United States Open last September and in the quarter-finals at the Wimbledon Open in July 2021.
It’s starting to look like increasingly familiar territory.
“It’s like everything in life. When you reach new milestones, you don’t feel, let’s say, as comfortable, or you feel like you’re out of your comfort zone. Now, of course, playing more and more Grand Slams and having made a semi-final, I feel more in my place,” observed Auger-Aliassime.
The Montreal tennis player has survived two grueling matches in his first two outings at Melbourne Park this year. In the first round on Tuesday, he fell two sets to one before defeating Finland’s Emil Ruusuvuori in 3 hours 40 minutes of play.
In the second round, two days later, he needed 4 hours 20 minutes to beat Spaniard Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in four sets that all required tiebreakers.