Felix Auger-Aliassime books first Australian Open quarterfinal berth

Felix Auger-Aliassime battled past Marin Cilic to secure his first Australian Open quarterfinal and 3r grand slam quarterfinal overall.

Canadian ninth seed Felix Auger-Aliassime earned a quarter-final berth when he outlasted veteran Croatian Marin Cilic 2-6 7-6(7) 6-2 7-6(4) at the Australian Open on Monday. The quarterfinal is the 3rd overall quarterfinal for Felix who has reached that stage at the last three grand slam events he played. It's been a great start for the year as he captained Canada at the ATP Cup where they won the trophy as well.

The match lasted close to four hours and it saw Auger-Aliassime overcome a loss of the first set to beat Cilic who is not an easy matchup for him. They played last year on grass with the Croatian winning in Stuttgart. Auger-Aliassime lost the opening set 2-6 but rallied to come back and win. The 2nd set was particularly key for him as it went to the tiebreak and it was a close one.

Felix outlasted Cilic with 9-7 before completely thrashing the Croatian in the next set 6-2. Cilic found some inspiration in the 4th as he played rather well with another tiebreak ending up deciding the match. This time around it was a bit easier for Auger-Aliassime who won 7-4. Next up is Daniil Medvedev and that will be a proper challenge for the Canadian.