Late-night finishes and five-set matches are becoming a habit for Taylor Fritz at Wimbledon this year.
On Wednesday, he wrapped up his win over Gabriel Diallo before the match was suspended — making sure the fifth-seeded American would not have to come back on court for a fourth straight day.
Fritz overcame a bloodied elbow to win 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7/0), 4-6, 6-3 on No. 1 Court a day after he finished off another five-set win over Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard in a match that was halted on Monday at about 10:15pm after Fritz forced a fifth set with Wimbledon’s 11pm curfew looming.
Photo: AP
He completed the win over Diallo a little later than that on Wednesday.
“That’s an incredibly hard match,” Fritz said. “The fourth set that I lost, I really don’t think there’s much I did wrong at all.”
Fritz sustained a cut to his elbow after diving to reach a ball when he had break point while trailing 3-2 in the fourth set. While he returned the ball, Diallo won the point and went on to hold serve.
Photo: EPA
Fritz was looking forward to a day off.
“Tomorrow [yesterday] is going to be a very, a very light hit. I think I’ve played plenty of tennis,” he said. “I’m very due a nice, relaxing day.”
In the women’s doubles on Wednesday, Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Wu Fang-hsien won their first-round matches at the All England Lawn Tennis Club in London.
Chan and partner Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic defeated Yulia Putintseva of Kazakhstan and the US’ Peyton Stearns 7-6 (7/5), 6-2, while Wu and Jiang Xinyu of China downed Chinese pair Zhu Lin and Tang Qianhui 6-4, 6-4.
Hsieh Su-wei and partner Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia were to play their first-round game after press time last night against Oksana Kalashnikova of Georgia and Russia’s Elena Pridankina.
In the men’s doubles, Taiwan’s Ray Ho and Yunchaokete Bu of China were to play Argentina’s Horacio Zeballosa and Marcel Granollers of Spain.
Additional reporting by staff writer
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