Karen Khachanov survived the defeat at the European Open, Antwerp, Belgium after banning the host who received the wildcard, Zizou Bergs with 5-7, 6-4, 6-4.
The world number 17 has claimed a number of break chances in the last two sets to make his way to his third quarterfinal of the 2020 season after 2 hours 22 minutes. He qualified for the quarter-finals for the second time in a row after last week he qualified for the St.Petersburg Open.
The Russian national was forced to play extra hard to claim her 20th win of the season (20-12) after Bergs played a lot of attacks, including striking the Russian forehand on her way to claiming the first set.
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But Khachanov put Bergs in an uncomfortable position by attacking in the net area at the crucial moment to turn things around.
Bergs is looking to become the first player outside the top 500 to advance to the quarter-finals since Andy Murray made his way to the 2019 China Open quarter-finals.
In the quarterfinals of the European Open, the third seed, Karen Khachanov, will challenge the British national, Dan Evans. Evans won their previous meeting in Rotterdam earlier this season.
In other action, Milos Raonic showed impressive serve to advance to his fifth quarter-final of the season when he edged out Evans’ compatriot Cameron Norrie by a tight 7-5 7-6 result.
Fifth seed Raonic landed 19 aces and dropped just four points from his first serve to overthrow Norrie in 1 hour 49 minutes. Thanks to the win, the fifth seed advanced to the quarter-finals of the indoor hard-court tournament for the second consecutive time after qualifying for the semifinals of St.Petersburg Open last week.
With the win over Norrie, Raonic has recorded 19-8 this season and will duel against fourth seed Grigor Dimitrov. The meeting at the European Open this week will be the sixth meeting between the Canadian national against Bulgarian Dimitrov.
To date, Dimitrov has been leading by 3-2, but the fifth seed won their last encounter in Madrid for the 2018 season.
Raonic is looking to win his first title since beating Roger Federer to win the eighth title of his career in Brisbane for the 2016 season. Since then, the world number 17 has strolled to seven finals, including this season’s Cincinnati Open (Western & Southern Open) before losing to Novak Djokovic.
