As F\u00e9lix Auger-Aliassime moves on to the U.S. Open quarterfinals for the first time since 2021, don\u2019t call him \u201cFelix 2.0\u201d.<\/p>\n
He\u2019s not reinvented as much as he is refreshed, healthy again, and with the passing of the years, more experienced and mature.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt feels even better than the first time,\u201d a beaming Auger-Aliassime said after a surprisingly undramatic 7-5, 6-3, 6-4 win over No. 15 seed Andrey Rublev of Russia on Monday afternoon.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt 21, I was kind of on my way up. Then, to have a few setbacks, injuries, struggles with confidence and to come back for a second time, it feels more deserved. And I\u2019m soaking up every moment,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
As with No. 3 seed Alexander Zverev of Germany, whom he defeated in four sets Saturday night, Auger-Aliassime came into Monday’s match with a lopsided head-to-head record that was entirely not in his favour. Against Zverev, it was 2-6; against Rublev, it was 1-7, although most of those clashes had been close.<\/p>\n
In women’s doubles action, Ottawa’s Gabriela Dabrowski and New Zealand’s Erin Routliffe defeated No. 13 seed Cristina Bucas of Spain and Nicole Melichar-Martinez of the United States 6-4, 6-2 to advance to the quarterfinals.<\/p>\n
Dabrowski and Routliffe, the third seed, will next face the 11th-seeded pairing of Hungary’s Timea Babos and Brazil’s Luisa Stefani.<\/p>\n
Leylah Fernandez of Laval, Que., and tennis legend Venus Williams also advanced to the quarterfinals in women’s doubles play with a 6-3, 6-4 win over No. 12 seed Zhang Shuai of China and Ekaterina Alexandrova of Russia.<\/p>\n
Fernandez and Williams await the winner between top-seeded Taylor Townsend of the United States and Czechia’s Katerina Siniakova and Colombia’s Camila Osorio and China’s Yuan Yue.<\/p>\n
Auger-Aliassime\u2019s runs into the second weeks of Grand Slam tournaments were almost a given in the early years of his career. He made the quarterfinals or better in three straight majors, from Wimbledon in 2021 \u2014 when he was still just 20 \u2014 through to the Australian Open in 2022.<\/p>\n
That was the last time he made the final eight, until this week. He\u2019ll play No. 8 seed Alex de Minaur in the quarterfinals on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Against de Minaur, he has a 2-1 record with the two victories, both on hard courts, dating back to 2022. If he can win that, he could head to a rematch with world No. 1 and defending champion Jannik Sinner.<\/p>\n
Auger-Aliassime managed to win just two games when the two met in the quarterfinals in Cincinnati just a few weeks ago. It was a bitter defeat, even more because it came right on the heels of a disappointing opening-round loss to world No. 56 Fabian Maroszan at the National Bank Open in Toronto.<\/p>\n
The pressure to do well at a home tournament is a constant, no matter where one hails from.<\/p>\n
But part of the gradual evolution of Auger-Aliassime in recent months \u2014 work, he says, that has been constant behind the scenes but had yet to pay off in a big result \u2014 is a change in mindset about handling losses.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not as though there are any secrets in tennis. The advice is generally the same, no matter who you\u2019re hearing it from. But perhaps, at 25 with so much more experience behind him, Auger-Aliassime is a little more willing to hear it.<\/p>\n
\u201cCertainly there were times when I wasn\u2019t listening as much,” he said. “But I\u2019m also listening to myself more, too, trusting myself. I think there were times when maybe I questioned myself a little too much after certain defeats. I was always so conscious of mistakes I made, being too much of a perfectionist.<\/p>\n
\u201cLike now, I lost in Toronto, in Cincinnati, but I made less of a big deal about it than I might have in the past. So I think that has also helped me rebound more quickly and perform better in the next tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n
There\u2019s an entire generation of players who were almost the players-in-waiting, ready to step in and win major titles once the iconic triumvirate of Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic finally retired. Only Djokovic, 38, remains of the three.<\/p>\n
But what seemed like a natural succession has been unmercifully sabotaged by the two newcomers: Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz.<\/p>\n
But Auger-Aliassime seems to be headed in the right direction again.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m much more aware and far more strategic now about what I want to improve,\u201d Auger-Aliassime said. \u201cWhen you\u2019re 20 or 21, you do things more on instinct, I did what I could do, and sort of went with a feeling. These last years, I\u2019ve worked in a way to get back to a level where I know I can maintain it, try to be more consistent, and try to better master what I\u2019m doing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Auger-Aliassime isn\u2019t getting ahead of himself. He hopes this isn\u2019t just a hot streak, a fluke, because he knows how much work went on behind the scenes.<\/p>\n
\u201cI hope to still go further here, and also reproduce this level in the future.\u201d he said. \u201cI think I\u2019m much generally more clear-headed about my choices off the court, in my preparation, with my team, and with my life in general.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think it\u2019s normal for that to come at a certain age. It\u2019s what all of us try to do \u2014 be a little more mature, a little better, with every passing year.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As F\u00e9lix Auger-Aliassime moves on to the U.S. Open quarterfinals for the first time since 2021, don\u2019t call…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":110380,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-110379","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-tennis","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/110380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}