De Minaur powers into quarter-finals of Rotterdam Open

The way the world No.8 dismantled the power game of rising teenage star Jakub Mensik 6-4 6-4 on Thursday suggested he can go one better than last year’s final at the Rotterdam Ahoy arena when, again, Sinner proved too good.

But his Italian nemesis isn’t defending his title, doubtless much to de Minaur’s relief, with the Australian looking well set to at least reach the semi-finals as he’ll be hot favourite against German lucky loser Daniel Altmaier in Friday’s quarters.  

De Minaur has now reached the last-eight in four consecutive Rotterdam editions – the only man to have done that previously was a certain Roger Federer – and he allowed himself a pat on his own back for executing his game plan perfectly to defuse the power of 19-year-old Czech Mensik.

“I took a little bit of speed off my serve and focused a little bit more on percentage. That was key because I didn’t want to give him a look at too many second serves where he could really be aggressive and try to dictate,” explained de Minaur afterwards.

“I’m glad I executed that. The game plan worked really well today.

It took just one break of the 19-year-old Czech’s huge serve in each set to send de Minaur on his way, while he didn’t give up even a break point on his own delivery.

“It’s never easy playing Jakub, he’s one of the best servers on tour, manages to get a lot of free points and at times it is quite frustrating to play him. 

“One of the key things for me in this sort of match-up is just try to be calm, and tell myself I’m going to give myself chances on return, just worry about my service games and apply enough pressure on his to get those crucial breaks.”

World No.47 Mensik is the only teenager in the top-50, but third seed de Minaur made him look very much still like a work in progress.

He coughed up only 15 unforced mistakes to Mensik’s 43, with the one-hour 27-minute victory setting up the Australian for a last-eight clash with Altmaier, who earned a surprise 6-4 3-6 7-5 victory over 20-year-old French riser Arthur Fils.

The German world No.93 Altmaier is making the best of his ‘lucky loser’ break, reinstated after being kayoed in the final qualifying round, but shouldn’t cause de Minaur a problem.

That won’t be the case, though, if the Australian makes the semi-final, as he could run into Stefanos Tsitsipas, who holds an 11-1 win record over him.

The Greek sixth seed had to save a match point before edging local Dutch hope Tallon Griekspoor 6-7 (5-7) 7-6 (8-6) 7-5 and will next play exciting Italian leftie Mattia Bellucci, who caused the shock of the week by downing second seed Daniil Medvedev on Wednesday.