Follow the latest news on the 2024 Paris Olympics
A dream Olympic men's tennis final between Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz is still on the cards after they both made it through into the last eight at Roland Garros on Wednesday.
Serbia’s Djokovic kept his dream of Games gold alive as he beat Germany’s Dominik Koepfer in straight sets, while Spain's Alcaraz also reached the quarter-finals with a comfortable 6-4, 6-2 win against Roman Safiullin.
In the women's draw, top seed Iga Swiatek of Poland made the semi-finals after a dramatic match in which her American opponent Danielle Collins retired with the scores at 6-1, 2-6, 4-1.
Djokovic, who beat Spain’s Rafael Nadal 6-1, 6-4 in the second round, came through 7-5, 6-3 in an hour and 37 minutes against Koepfer on Court Philippe Chatrier.
The 24-time Grand Slam champion has just one major honour missing from his collection, the Olympic gold medal, and he has made no secret of his desire to put that right.
Djokovic squandered a break in the first set against Koepfer before grinding down the German to take the opener. The 37 year old then went into overdrive to clinch the second set comfortably and go through to the last eight.
The Serb, the No 1 seed in Paris, is making his fifth Olympics appearance and his best performance was bronze in Beijing in 2008 – the year that Nadal won gold.
Afterwards, Djokovic said: “Bringing a medal to Serbia is always a big goal of mine, has been since my first Olympic Games in Beijing, where I managed to get my only medal so far.
“I had actually some really good Olympic Games but that semi-final hurdle was, three out of four times, tough for me to go through.”
Djokovic will face Stefanos Tsitsipas of Greece, who beat Argentina’s Sebastian Baez 7-5, 6-1, in Thursday’s quarter-finals.
Alcaraz reached the last eight after a dominant straight-sets win over Safiullin. The second seed made light work of the Russian, representing the AIN team for neutral athletes, taking just 90 minutes on Court Suzanne-Lenglen to seal his place in the last eight.
However, later in the day, Alcaraz and his partner Rafael Nadal were knocked out of the doubles on the same court in their quarter-final against the USA’s Austin Krajicek and Rajeev Ram, losing 6-2, 6-4.
The match could be the end of the road for Nadal, who won 14 of his 22 Grand Slam titles on the red clay of Paris, after two years that have been plagued by injuries.
The veteran was earlier knocked out of the singles tournament by his old foe Novak Djokovic 6-1, 6-4.
Alcaraz, the defending French Open champion who also sealed the Wimbledon title earlier this month, will next face ninth seed Tommy Paul of the US, who ended French hopes of a home medal when he beat the unseeded Corentin Moutet 7-6 6-3, in the singles last eight.
The Frenchman battled gamely but after saving six match points he sent the ball long, putting Paul into the last eight.
“I really believed in myself until the last point. It’s never over. I was pretty close to breaking in the last game, so I really believed in it,” said Moutet, who dropped out of this month’s Wimbledon due to injury.
“I knew that if I lost today, we wouldn’t have any chance to take a medal but it was a big motivation as well.”
Russian Daniil Medvedev, representing the AIN team, fell to a shock defeat to Canada’s Felix Auger-Aliassime.
The 2021 US Open champion went down 6-3, 7-6 to the Canadian, who will face either Casper Ruud of Norway or Argentina’s Francisco Cerundolo in the next round.
In the women’s draw, top seed Swiatek of Poland made it through to the semi-finals after a dramatic game in which she was struck in the chest by the ball before her American opponent Collins retired injured.
Swiatek was hit by a full-blooded backhand from Collins in the third set. The Pole took evasive action but was still struck a painful blow and crouched on the ground, catching her breath before continuing. Collins immediately crossed to Swiatek’s side of the net to apologise. Collins was later forced to retire.
Wimbledon champion Barbora Krejcikova of the Czech Republic bowed out with a 6-4, 6-2 loss to Anna Karolina Schmiedlova of Slovakia in the quarter-finals.
Next up for Schmiedlova in the semi-final will be either Donna Vekic of Croatia or Marta Kostyuk of Ukraine.
