Roland-Garros: A first Grand Slam quarter-final for Casper Ruud and for Norwegian tennis
Casper Ruud beats Hubert Hurkacz in four sets and will meet either fourth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas or Holger Rune for a place in the semi-finals
Norway’s Casper Ruud, the No 8 seed, is through to his first career Grand Slam quarter-final after scoring a straight sets win over Poland’s Hubert Hurkacz at Roland-Garros on Monday. It also marked the first time that a Norwegian player has advanced to the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam event.
Ruud needed two-and-a-half hours to defeat Hurkacz 6-2, 6-3, 3-6, 6-3 on Court Suzanne Lenglen to advance to the last eight where he will meet either fourth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas or Danish teen Holger Rune.
In previous rounds, Ruud had defeated French wild card Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (6-7 [6], 7-6 [4], 6-2, 7-6), Finland’s Emil Ruusuvuori (6-3, 6-4, 6-2) and Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego, the No 32 seed (6-2, 6-7 [3], 1-6, 6-4, 6-3).
Ruud, who won the Geneva Open in the week prior to Paris, has now won his last eight matches in a row and 11 of his last 12 matches on the tour.
Casper Ruud becomes fifth top 8 seed on the men’s side to reach French Open quarter-finals
Ruud becomes the fifth top 8 seed in the men’s draw to reach the quarter-finals at Roland-Garros in 2022. The Norwegian joins top seed Novak Djokovic, No 3 Alexander Zverev, No 5 Rafael Nadal, and No 6 Carlos Alcaraz in the last eight.
Second seed Daniil Medvedev, fourth seed Stefanos Tsitsipas and seventh seed Andrey Rublev will complete their fourth round matches on Wednesday, leaving the possibility open that all the top 8 men’s seeds would make it through to the quarter-finals.