{"id":733894,"date":"2026-08-10T21:50:41","date_gmt":"2026-08-10T21:50:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/733894\/"},"modified":"2026-08-10T21:50:41","modified_gmt":"2026-08-10T21:50:41","slug":"rafael-jodar-advances-past-jiri-lehecka-in-montreal-arthur-fils-downs-cameron-norrie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/733894\/","title":{"rendered":"Rafael Jodar advances past Jiri Lehecka in Montreal, Arthur Fils downs Cameron Norrie"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spanish teen Rafael Jodar defeated Czech eighth seed Jiri Lehecka 6-3, 6-3 on Saturday to reach the quarter-finals of the ATP Montreal Masters.<\/p>\n

Jodar<\/a> dominated the night match after an afternoon rain delay in the Masters 1000 hardcourt event.<\/p>\n

The 19-year-old Spaniard, runner-up last week in Washington, never let Lehecka<\/a> into their fourth-round match in collecting his 33rd victory of the season<\/a>.<\/p>\n

World number 15 Jodar has reached the last eight in seven of his past eight events and a Montreal title would send the youngster to a top-10 ranking for the first time.<\/p>\n

Jodar will play for a semi-final berth against French 18th seed Arthur Fils<\/a>, who defeated Britain’s Cameron Norrie<\/a> 6-2, 7-6(8)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Fils, who lost to Jodar last week in Washington, will play in his fourth Masters quarter-final of the year.<\/p>\n

“It was a very nice battle,” Fils said. “The second set was back and forth. He really raised his level. I got a bit tight but I’m happy to get out in two sets. I’m confident with how I’m playing right now.”<\/p>\n

Italian Luciano Darderi<\/a> fuelled himself with an espresso shot during a mid-match changeover in a 4-6, 6-3, 7-5<\/a> victory over Nuno Borges<\/a> to reach the quarter-finals.<\/p>\n

It was not the first time Darderi had downed his national rocket fuel to fire up the afterburners in a tight situation on court.<\/p>\n

Darderi will bid for the semis against Brandon Nakashima<\/a>, whose match with Arthur Rinderknech<\/a> was interrupted for nearly two hours with the final set level at 4-4.<\/p>\n

Players were taken off court due to rain and the threat of lightning, returning to finish after almost two hours.<\/p>\n

Nakashima withstood a love game from his French opponent but broke serve a game later before finishing a 7-6(4), 5-7, 7-5<\/a> victory on his first match point thanks to 22 unforced errors from Rinderknech.<\/p>\n

He broke through in a Masters round of 16 after losing in his first five matches at this level.<\/p>\n

“Coming out after the break I knew I had to fire at the beginning,” Nakashima said. “My level is growing with each match and I’m trying to make the most of it.”<\/p>\n

\"MatchMatch statsFlashscore<\/p>\n

ATP number 22 Darderi will be playing in an ATP-leading 10th quarter-final of the season after earning his 30th victory of 2026.<\/p>\n

Darderi will be playing in his second Masters last-eight of the season after achieving the quarters last May at home in Rome.<\/p>\n

‘I deserved this win’<\/p>\n

The 24-year-old overcame more than 40 winners off the racquet of his Portuguese opponent, starting his comeback in the second set with a 5-2 lead and carrying momentum into the third.<\/p>\n

Darderi broke for 4-3 as Borges double-faulted but lost his own serve moments later for 4-all.<\/p>\n

The Italian got an insurance break for 6-5 as a net cord bounced out for Borges, then served out the triumph with an ace on match point a game later.<\/p>\n

“This is my first Masters quarter-final on hardcourt so I’m very pleased,” the winner said. “I like the conditions here and the crowd helped me in the third set.<\/p>\n

“I deserved this win. I’ve improved my hardcourt game a lot. I try to play every match at full power. Paying well on hard is good for me after starting (my career) on clay.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Spanish teen Rafael Jodar defeated Czech eighth seed Jiri Lehecka 6-3, 6-3 on Saturday to reach the quarter-finals…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":733895,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[101,118,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-733894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733894","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=733894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733894\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/733895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=733894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=733894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=733894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}