Photo: Thomas Guenther
As he looks to reach the semi-finals of an ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament for just the second time in his career, Marcos will have to overturn a 0-6 record against World No. 1 Rafael Nadal. The pair meets in a highly anticipated quarter-final match on Friday evening at the Western & Southern Financial Group Masters in Cincinnati.
A well-below-par Nadal was forced to save one match point as he battled past France’s Julien Benneteau on Thursday afternoon. The Spaniard, holder of a record 18 ATP World Tour Masters 1000 trophies, is playing his second tournament since winning back-to-back titles at Roland Garros and Wimbledon. On his return to action last week in Toronto he reached the semi-finals, before losing to Andy Murray.
While Marcos has never beaten Nadal in their six previous meetings, he can take a lot of confidence from his high-quality performance against Berdych in the third round. To add to that, when he recorded his best-ever win over Roger Federer earlier this year in Indian Wells, he also went into that match with a 0-6 losing record against the Swiss.
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Nadal is certainly expecting a tough battle. “We had very tough matches in this the past, too. Sometimes win or lose depends on a few things. It's not depends on a game, sometimes depends on few points,” said the Mallorcan. “I didn't see him playing, but to beat against Berdych he must be playing really well. I have to play aggressive, I have to serve well, and return better than today, because today my return was, no comments. And that's it. Just wait that he doesn't have his inspiration there, and just try to play my best tennis.”
The match has been scheduled to take place not before 7:00pm on Stadium. Check out the full order of play here.
Watch the match live online at TennisTV (Territory restrictions apply)
Stay tuned to www.baghdatis.com for all the latest news and photos from Cincinnati.
Go, Marcos!
