By Richard Pagliaro | Tuesday, March 15, 2022
Taylor Fritz fired his 11th ace closing a dramatic 6-4, 2-6, 7-6(2) victory over tough Spanish qualifier Jaume Munar in Indian Wells.
Photo credit: Getty
Suspense spiked at the start of the decisive tiebreaker.
Taylor Fritz threw down powerful punctuation to end it.
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Fritz fired his 11th ace closing a dramatic 6-4, 2-6, 7-6(2) victory over tough Spanish qualifier Jaume Munar in a sticky two hour, 49-minute Indian Wells triumph today.
Last October, Fritz made his maiden Masters 1000 semifinal at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden. Now, Fritz feels he's in position to go even further.
"I am a better player than when I came here last year," Fritz said. "Like I said, there's things that I need to fine-tune. Didn't play bad today, but there's things I absolutely need to do a lot better. Hopefully being on the court for almost three hours today helps me. I think I'll be feeling pretty good timing-wise hitting the ball, definitely hit enough balls.
"I need to take it one match at a time. We'll see."
Today’s victory vaults Fritz into a fourth-round showdown vs. nemesis Alex de Minaur. The 29th-seeded Aussie saved six of seven break points in a 7-6(2), 6-4 win over American Tommy Paul, who had upset third-seeded Alexander Zverev in round two.
The 31st-ranked de Minaur has beaten Fritz in three of four meetings though Fritz won their last encounter at the 2021 US Open.
"It's always really tough playing Demon. He's really tough to play," Fritz said of de Minaur. "He wins a lot of points that are pretty frustrating just by how many balls he gets back.
"Going to be a lot less pressure going into this match than the other two because I know I'm going to have to play really well. I know that it's going to be super tough. What I did to beat him at the Open is still pretty fresh in my mind. I think I have a pretty good idea of what I need to do."
Wimbledon finalist Matteo Berrettini blasted 12 aces and won 36 of 41 first-serve points defeating Lloyd Harris 6-4, 7-5. The sixth-seeded Berrettini will face Miomir Kecmanovic for a quarterfinal spot. Kecmanovic out-dueled Botic van de Zandschulp 7-6(3), 7-5.
The 20th-ranked Fritz was up a break at 4-1 in the decider and seemed to be in charge.
Munar was far from done. The Spaniard broke back in the seventh game then churned through a seven-minute hold for 4-all.
The 99th-ranked Munar showed his toughness on Sunday when he saved three match points stunning compatriot Pablo Carreno Busta, 4-6, 6-4, 7-6(4) after the 16th-seeded Carreno Busta served for the match at 6-5 in the third set.
While Munar was winning several of the grinding baseline rallies in the final stages today, he also showed a knack for net prevailing in 27 of 33 trips to net.
In a tense 11th game, Fritz came forward finishing with a backhand volley to hold for 6-5. Munar thumped a smash sealing a love hold to force the final tiebreaker.
A draining 27-shot rally—longest of the match—opened proceedings with Fritz flowing forward behind a backhand to knock off a volley winner.
The combination of Fritz’s assertiveness and the fact the Spaniard was playing his fifth match of the tournament invoked some fatigue in Munar who missed successive running forehands as Fritz stretch his lead to 4-1.
Sliding a serve winner gave Fritz a fistful of match points. Fritz slashed his 11th ace to end a two-hour and 49 minute thriller pounding his palm over his heart in celebration with another battle to come.