Nishikori booked his place in a maiden major final after earning the biggest victory of his career, overcoming the then-world number one Djokovic<\/a> in four sets. <\/p>\n The surprise result meant that Federer<\/a>, scheduled to play Cilic in the other semifinal, was the overwhelming favourite to go on and clinch the trophy in New York. <\/p>\n The Swiss legend was denied the opportunity to play for his 19th major crown, however, when, in straight sets, the Croatian produced one of the greatest performances of his career to reach the final.<\/p>\n Cilic won 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 at Arthur Ashe Stadium and received a message from Federer at the net after match point. <\/p>\n Marin Cilic recalls beating Roger Federer at the 2014 US Open<\/p>\n In an interview with \u2018The Tennis Mentor\u2019, the former world number three said of the triumph: \u201c[It was] just incredible.<\/p>\n \u201cEven closing that match, it was an incredible game to see. To serve it out. And when I won, it was just pure emotion, pure happiness, a beautiful smile at the end.\u201d<\/p>\n Cilic revealed: \u201cThen, when I came to the net, Roger said incredibly beautiful words: \u2018So happy for you buddy\u2019.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, we know each other from the tour, but you know, we\u2019re still rivals. It was still a rivalry and [it was] an intense moment in those semifinals to go into the final, and you know, that was just a beautiful moment.\u201d <\/p>\n Marin Cilic says he knew Kei Nishikori was in the final before he played Roger Federer<\/p>\n When asked if he knew that Nishikori had beaten Djokovic before he stepped on court to play Federer, Cilic replied: \u201cOf course.<\/p>\n \u201cI mean, it had even bigger impact on me winning because up to that point I think Roger hadn\u2019t won a slam in, I don\u2019t know, five, six, eight slams that he has played. <\/p>\n \u201cIt was quite long and probably the biggest gap that he hasn\u2019t had won a Slam since, you know, he started winning.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd then just going on to the court knowing that feeling of, you know, he\u2019s got Nishikori in the final and it might add extra pressure on him. <\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t have it too much in my mind, I was just okay, you know, playing my instincts,\u201d said the 36-year-old. <\/p>\n In the final, Cilic overcame Nishikori<\/a> in another straight-sets victory to hoist the US Open title, becoming the second Croatian in history to win a men\u2019s singles Grand Slam, following his coach at the time, Goran Ivanisevic<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 2014 US Open marked one of two Grand Slams in the 2010s where none of Roger Federer,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":156008,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[71858,4037,99,428,11883],"class_list":{"0":"post-156007","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tennis","8":"tag-marin-cilic","9":"tag-roger-federer","10":"tag-sports","11":"tag-tennis","12":"tag-us-open"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156007","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=156007"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/156007\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/156008"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=156007"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=156007"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=156007"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"TENNIS:](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/GettyImages-579039518-1024x768.jpg\")
Photo by Cynthia Lum\/Icon SMI\/Corbis\/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images<\/p>\n