Holding a two-set lead over World No. 1 Jannik Sinner in a potential upset, No. 19 seed Grigor Dimitrov was forced to retire with an apparent pectoral muscle injury in the third set, allowing the Italian star to advance to the Wimbledon quarterfinals on Monday.
Dimitrov of Bulgaria, who held a 6-3, 7-5, 2-2 lead at the time, was hitting a volley on Sinner’s serve when he fell to the ground and grabbed his right pectoral with his left hand. After being tended to by trainers, Dimitrov walked to the bench to continue to receive treatment. He then left the court for medical timeout, returning soon after to concede the match to Sinner with a handshake.
Dimitrov was seeking his deepest run at Wimbledon since the 2014 semifinals, but instead Sinner will continue his run to fourth Grand Slam win since the 2024 Australian Open. He also won the Aussie Open this year and claimed the U.S. Open title last September.
Right off the bat, Dimitrov took control by breaking Sinner’s first serve and didn’t lose a service game in winning the first set 6-3. Dimitrov again broke Sinner’s first serve in the second set. The Italian rebounded to avoid an 0-2 hole and eventually pulled even at 5-5. The Bulgarian, ranked No. 21 in the world, broke Sinner’s serve and held on for a 7-5 win and a 2-0 lead.
Sinner, who took a medical timeout during the second set for an elbow issue, secured his first break of the match after the timeout and appeared to be fine from that point. In the third set, both players held serve into a 2-2 tie before Dimitrov’s match-ending injury.
“I don’t know what to say,” Sinner said after the match. “He is an incredible player, I think we all saw this today. He’s been so unlucky in the past couple of years.
“Very, very unlucky from his side. I don’t take this as a win at all. This is just a very unfortunate moment to witness for all of us.”
Sinner will take on No. 10 seed Ben Shelton, who had to work more than three hours to defeat unseeded Lorenzo Sonego of Italy, 3-6, 6-1, 7-6 (1), 7-5, and reach his first Wimbledon quarterfinals.
Shelton, who has eliminated Sonego in each of the Grand Slams so far this year, dropped the first set after the Italian pulled out all the stops — slices, lobs, drop shots, delayed serves — to throw the American off his game.
Sonego kept it up in the second set, but Shelton was on his game, including converting two break points to even the set with a 6-1 win. The third set when to a tiebreak, with Shelton earned the winning point on a lunging backhand return.
In the fourth set, Sonego held his serve to forge a 5-5 tie as he looked to even the match, but after Shelton broke him, he drilled a pair of cross-court returns to close out the hard-fought victory.
Novak Djokovic rebounded from a set down to defeat Australian Alex de Minaur 1-6, 6-4, 6-4, 6-4 and advance to the quarterfinals.
The No. 6-seeded Serbian counts seven wins at Wimbledon among his 24 Grand Slam victories. He is seeking to join Roger Federer, who watched the match from the Royal Box, as the only men with eight singles titles on the grass court in London.
In his post-match interview, the 38-year-old Djokovic admitted to being nervous ahead of the three-hour, 18-minute match, and it showed in the opening set. He double faulted four times and was broken on serve three times, while registering only eight winners against 16 unforced errors.
But de Minaur, the 26-year-old Australian and No. 11 seed, couldn’t capitalize on two big chances he had in subsequent sets.
In the second, with Djokovic serving up 5-4, de Minaur had two break points but couldn’t convert and lost the set. In the fourth, he took a 4-1 lead but allowed Djokovic to rattle off five consecutive games.
“I am still trying to process the whole match and what happened on court,” Djokovic said. “It wasn’t a great start for me; it was a great start for him. He broke my serve three times in the first set. Very windy, swirly conditions on the court. He was just managing better with the play from the back of the court.
“I didn’t have many solutions but I managed to reset myself. It was kind of a tough game to close out the second set. Perhaps that was a momentum shift where I just felt like ‘OK, I am back in the game.’ It was a lot of cat-and-mouse play, a lot of slices and he is so good at it.”
It was the 101st win at Wimbledon for Djokovic, who trails only Federer (105) in wins.
He acknowledged Federer in the crowd in his post-match remarks and said he wish he had some of the tools of the Swiss great.
“It was a very difficult encounter, some very challenging moments for me. Sometimes, I wish I had a serve and volley and a nice touch from the gentleman who is standing right there, that would help,” Djokovic said.
Up next for Djokovic is No. 22 seed Flavio Cobelli of Italy, who reached his first Wimbledon quarters by defeating Serbian Marin Cilic 6-4, 6-4, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (3). The match lasted nearly 3 1/2 hours.
Cilic had 19 aces but was undone by 64 unforced errors.
–Field Level Media
