Towards Djokovic and Medvedev's offender: Khachanov and Rublev entered the fourth round of Roland Garros

Rublyov's winning serve

Less than a week after Andrei Rublev became the winner of the clay tournament in Hamburg, he had already completed the fourth round of the French Open.

In the third round match, the Russian defeated South African Kevin Anderson in three sets, spending a little more than an hour and a half on the match.

In the past, the opponents have already met on the court once.

In 2015, Anderson defeated Rublev in the first round of the US Open.

Then the South African was one of the world stars, and the Russian was still a promising tennis player who made his way into the main draw through qualifications.

Now they have changed places - Rublev should soon become one of the ten best players on the planet, and Anderson got to Roland Garros according to a protected rating, being only the 118th racket in the world.

Rublev immediately started the match from a position of strength and made a break in the first game on the opponent's serve.

This was enough to win the opening game, in which Anderson had no chance of a reverse break.

In the second set, the Russian also outlined his advantage early and brought his serve to perfection, losing only three points on it.

The next game was also dictated by Rublev.

Anderson was able to impose a fight only in the last game, having played two match points on his serve, but in the end he was defeated with a final score of 6: 3, 6: 2, 6: 3.

Although Anderson had a brilliant aces, and he was able to earn 13 points with their help, he still made much more misfires.

The South African made 33 unforced errors, while Rublev's figure was almost two times lower.

On his first serve, the Russian lost only four rallies, and this is a very worthy figure that should inspire awe in future opponents.

Rublev will start his second week at Roland Garros with a match against Marton Fuchovic.

The Hungarian in the first round sensationally knocked out Daniil Medvedev, and in the 1/8 finals he came out after defeating the Brazilian Thiago Monteiro, to whom he gave nine games.

Rublev will try not only to take revenge for the defeat of his compatriot, but also to extend his winning streak to nine matches.

Khachanov's win-win first week

If for Rublev this is the first participation in the second week of Roland Garros, then Karen Khachanov was able to achieve the same success for the fourth time in a row.

He has never been eliminated from the main clay tournament before the fourth round, and this season he continued that tradition.

In the 1/16 finals, Khachanov met with the Chilean Kristyan Garin.

He managed to climb to 19th place in the ATP rankings, which is only three positions lower than the Russian held before the start of the French Open.

But in the first set, there was no question of any equal fight between tennis players.

Khachanov immediately won three games in a row on someone else's serve and took the lead with a score of 4: 1.

When Garin tried to recoup, the Russian felt confident at the break points.

He only gave up one more game before winning the set.

In the second game, Khachanov suddenly had a failure to serve.

He missed the first ball half the time, and rarely scored points on the second try.

Errors led to a break for Garin with the score 4: 2.

In fact, the Russian had no moments to rectify the situation, and this could be a wake-up call for him.

But in the next set, Khachanov kept the serve in character, and the game returned to its usual course.

Each next game, the opponents calmly took their serve, until suddenly Garin had a failure.

He allowed the Russian to make two breaks in a row, without gaining a single point.

Although the Chilean was able to recoup from one, it was too late to save the second time - Khachanov had already led the sets again.

In the fourth game, it became very difficult for Garin at the reception.

Khachanov gave him only two points on serve and made three aces.

With the score 2: 2, only the Russian won the games, bringing the match to victory two and a half hours after its start.

Further it will not be so easy for Khachanov.

His next opponent will be the first racket of the world Novak Djokovic.

In the third round match, he easily outplayed the lacquer loser Daniel-Elai Golan from Colombia.

So far, the Serbian tennis player in no match in Paris has not given more than five games to his opponents and, accordingly, not a single set.