"After he worked on it, honestly, no problems. It was gone": Taylor Fritz continues to battle bizarre peaks and troughs with knee problem

Taylor Fritz hailed the level of his deciding-set performance as “really high” after battling past fellow American Marcos Giron 6-4, 5-7, 7-6 at the Dallas Open to book a Last 16 meeting with Brandon Nakashima.

In a Dallas Open match packed with quality shot-making from both players, Fritz produced a stunning behind-the-back winner off the net post and surged through the final-set tiebreak 7-1, underlining what he felt was one of his strongest returning displays in recent memory.

“I think the level in the third set was really high,” Fritz said afterwards on Tennis Channel. “Coming back after losing the second – which wasn’t a bad set for me either – it was kind of just an unfortunate miss I had at 6-5, 30-love, and that ended up costing me.

“But in the third set, I thought from start to finish I returned serve about as well as I could for an entire set. I don’t think I played one bad return game. It sounds crazy because I didn’t break, but it’s one of the best returning sets I’ve played in a long time.

“And then in the tiebreaker, I did a really good job of keeping that level up and also making a ton of first serves.”

Fritz raced into a 5-0 lead in the deciding breaker, having consciously adjusted his approach after feeling he had been too predictable earlier in the match.

“It changes depending on the match, but in this one I set myself some rules,” he explained of his mindset going into the tiebreak. “I felt like there were certain things I was doing where I was almost being stubborn and kept repeating them.

“I kept trying to rip a forehand open court to his forehand. I hit a lot of good shots, but I just kept getting burned. So I tried to set some rules and be really disciplined with myself about the shots I was hitting. And then obviously, it’s always about focusing on making first serves.”

One of the standout moments of the night came earlier in the contest when Fritz produced a spectacular behind-the-back winner after Giron’s reply clipped the net cord and forced him off balance.

“At that point, my momentum was taking me to the right and toward the line, so there was nothing else I could really do,” he said. “That was the only shot available. It was just kind of a reflex.”

While the shot looked extraordinary, Fritz admitted it was not entirely unfamiliar territory.

“That kind of shot actually happens sometimes in practice when you’re volleying,” he said. “You might think you’re about to hit a forehand and then someone goes behind you, and you just kind of mess around. I’ve hit that shot before messing around in practice.

“In that situation, though, I didn’t really need to think about it. Like I said, my momentum was carrying me so much to the right that I had no other option.”

The contest marked his eighth official meeting with Giron, though the pair’s shared training base in Los Angeles means their familiarity runs far deeper.

“You said eight meetings, but that’s nothing compared to how much we’ve practised over the years,” Fritz said. “I’ve probably practised and played more practice sets with Marcos than anybody else on tour.

“We know each other so well. And on these courts – a fast, low-bouncing court – it’s really tough conditions to play him. I knew tonight was going to be a really tough one.”

Next up is another familiar face in Nakashima, though Fritz feels that rivalry has not quite reached the same level of insight.

“With someone like Brandon, we haven’t really played or practised enough for it to reach that same level of familiarity,” he said.

There was also a brief injury concern early in the match when Fritz took a medical timeout for his knee, but he played down the issue afterwards.

“It had nothing to do with the tendinitis I’ve been dealing with for a while,” he clarified. “It was weird. I don’t know if I did it on a return or running for the first ball of his service game, but it happened on the first point of that game.

“I kind of just tweaked my knee. When I was lifting it, I was getting a sharp pain. It got a little better the next game when I served, and then I called the physio over just to make sure everything was good.

“After he worked on it, honestly, no problems. It was gone. So it was just a weird little tweak.”