Dominic Thiem beat Roberto Bautista Agut 7-6 (5), 3-6, 6-4 to reach the quarterfinals of the ATP250 event in Bastad, Sweden on Thursday.
Former US Open champion Thiem returned to professional tennis in March this year after sitting out for nine months due to a wrist injury sustained at the 2021 Mallorca Championships. On Tuesday, the 28-year-old Austrian got his first-tour level win in 426 days when he beat Finland’s Emil Ruusuvuori 3-6, 6-1, 7-6 (5) in the opening round.
In the round of 16 clash against world number 20 Bautista Agut, Thiem found himself trailing 2-5 in the opening set before staging a comeback to clinch it 7-5 in the tiebreak. However, the fourth-seeded Spaniard broke the Austrian twice in the second set and sealed it 6-3.
World number 339 Thiem, who had reached a career-high ranking of 3 in March 2020, got the crucial break in the fifth game of the final set and managed to serve for the win to reach his first tour-level quarterfinal since 2021 Madrid Masters.
“The win against Emil gave me confidence that I can compete against the best players in the world and today against Roberto,” said the Austrian.
“He is always such a tough opponent. I was expecting and hoping it would be a close match. Then when I won the first set in the tie-break I said ‘Hey, I can win today.’ I had the belief until the end of the match and the third set was really good.”
In the last-eight fixture, Thiem will face eighth-seeded Argentine Sebastian Baez, who defeated Spain’s Alejandro Davidovich Fokina 6-2, 6-3 in their round of 16 match.
(With inputs from AFP)
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