Australian Open: Dominic Thiem stunned by Grigor Dimitrov, Novak Djokovic wins
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Novak Djokovic is into the quarter-finals of the Australian Open for an 11th time
Defending champion Novak Djokovic came through a stiff test of his fitness as he moved into the Australian Open quarter-finals, but third seed Dominic Thiem was stunned by Grigor Dimitrov.
Bulgarian Dimitrov, a semi-finalist in 2017, dismantled the US Open champion of Austria 6-4 6-4 6-0.
World number one Djokovic, struggling with an abdominal injury picked up on Friday, beat Milos Raonic in four sets.
The Serbian eight-time Australian Open champion won 7-6 (7-4) 4-6 6-1 6-4.
Meanwhile, the 14th-seeded Raonic beat Marton Fucsovics of Hungary 7-6 (2), 5-7, 6-2, 6-2 and then watched his next opponent, top seed Novak Djokovic, suffer an injury, putting his status in doubt for the fourth round.
Djokovic said he tore a muscle during a fall in his five-set victory over American Taylor Fritz and might need to pull out of the tournament. I know it s a tear, definitely, of the muscle. So I don’t know if I’ll manage to recover from that in less than two days. I don’t know. I don’t know. I don’t know if I’m going to step out onto the court or not, said Djokovic, who is 11-0 against Raonic.
Ankita Raina becomes 3rd Indian woman to feature in Grand Slam main draw PTI
The year’s first Grand Slam starts here Monday.
After missing out on the women’s singles main draw, she still had a chance to qualify as a ‘lucky loser’ till the completion of the first round, but the 28-year-old realised a long-time dream when she signed up with Romania’s Mihaela Buzarnecu and earned a direct entry.
Only Sania Mirza and Nirupama Vaidyanathan have competed in the Grand Slam main draws for India before.
Ankita is only the second Indian after Sania, a six-time Grand Slam champion, to compete in the women’s doubles of a tennis major. Nirupama was the first to crack a Grand Slam main draw, back in 1998 at Australian Open.