With his presence at the French Open hanging desperately in the balance, Jack Draper stepped up to the baseline, down two sets to one, hoping he would begin the new set with a clean slate to initiate his resurgence. Instead, he could only watch on helplessly as his opponent threaded four outlandish winners to break his serve to love.
It was that kind of evening for Draper, the fifth seed in Paris, who was thoroughly outplayed by a stupendous performance from the unseeded Alexander Bublik. The Kazakhstani held his nerve in front of an ebullient Court Suzanne Lenglen crowd to close out an immense 5-7, 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 win and reach a grand slam quarter-final for the first time in his career.
