Stan Wawrinka fought off five match points but could not stop falling to a fourth successive defeat to Kevin Anderson, slipping out of the Aegon Championships in the second round.
Second seed Wawrinka was unable to extend the fine form that saw him sweep to the Roland Garros crown - even despite again sporting those infamous plaid shorts - with Anderson triumphing 7-6, 7-6.
The 30-year-old Swiss star had enjoyed stunning form on clay, dispatching huge favourite Novak Djokovic in Paris to seal his second grand slam triumph.
Big-serving South African Anderson dumped four-time champion Lleyton Hewitt out in the first round on the Australian crowd favourite’s last-ever Queen’s appearance.
And now the 29-year-old from Johannesburg has dismissed another star with a big following at the west London tournament.
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Anderson fired down 22 aces but still needed two match points on his own serve - and six in all - to edge home in the second of two tie breaks.
Anderson will now meet the winner of Alex Dolgopolov and Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in the quarter-finals.
After the match, Anderson revealed he is set to take US citizenship and have duel nationality later this year.
Anderson, who lives in Delray Beach in Florida and is married to an American, applied for US citizenship two years ago and the world No 17 expects the process to be completed in the next few months.
“The process is underway. Hopefully I will be approved and have US citizenship in the summer,” Anderson said.
Roger Federer kept his chances of an eighth title at Halle on track when he overpowered Latvian Ernests Gulbis 6-3, 7-5 to breeze into the Gery Weber quarter-finals in Germany.
The 33-year-old, 17-time grand slam winner was pushed to three sets in the previous round by German hope Philipp Kohlschreiber but had fewer problems with Gulbis. He will now meet Germany’s Florian Mayer who defeated American Steve Johnson 6-3, 7-6.
Meanwhile, Andy Murray must exploit all his qualities to reach the “proactive, aggressive” grass court tennis that can guide him to another Wimbledon title, according to Tim Henman.
Murray’s new coach, Jonas Bjorkman, has urged the player to take a leaf out of former world No 4 Henman’s serve-volley book at SW19 this summer in a bid to add to his 2013 title.
Henman, however, advised caution.
“I don’t think Andy should be serving and volleying every point, but it’s that type of variation that maybe one point a game he should look to serve and volley,” Henman told Press Association Sport.
“And certainly he should really attack the second serve because his returns are so good.”
Victoria Azarenka, the two-time grand slam winner who once seemed capable of becoming Serena Williams’s successor, suffered another of a seemingly endless sequence of injuries when she was forced to withdraw from the Birmingham grass court Open.
These have already contributed to a two-year drought of titles, the loss of the No 1 ranking in 2013, and a fall from the top ten last year.
Azarenka’s departure after only one match of this high quality warm-up event weakens her chances at Wimbledon. Once again her problem is a left foot injury, one of the ailments which sent her plummeting down the rankings.
“I tried to practise and it just doesn’t feel one hundred percent,” Azarenka said through a statement. “I don’t think it is the right time for me to take a risk right now, especially right before Wimbledon, and I need to make sure I have the best preparation possible.”
Earlier, Ana Ivanovic, who won the first grass court title of her career here last year, relinquished it at the first hurdle this year when she lost to qualifier Michelle Larcher de Brito.
The world No 7 from Serbia gained her highest ranking for more than six years after a great French Open earlier this month, but was beaten 6-4, 3-6, 7-6 by a US-based Portuguese player ranked outside the top 100.
Ivanovic even had a chance to serve for the match at 5-4 in the final set, but saw her opponent play a superb game to break back. After that de Brito played increasingly like a player with little to lose, striking some crucially potent blows in the deciding tie-break.
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