Fives were wild at the Australian Open on Wednesday. Fifth-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas upset Rafael Nadal in an epic five-set match to make the semifinals.
“I’m speechless. I have no words to describe what just happened on the court. My tennis speaks for itself.
Second-seeded Nadal, 34, took the first two sets fairly easily to run his streak of consecutive sets won at major tournaments to 35, one shy of Roger Federer’s record in the professional era.
But he made some mistakes in a third-set tiebreaker and dropped it.
Tsitsipas, 22, then took the fourth set, too.
“I don’t know what happened after the third set. I flew like a little bird,” Tsitsipas said.
Previously, Nadal had only once lost a Grand Slam match after taking the first two sets. That happened at the 2015 US Open against Fabio Fognini.
Nadal and Federer are currently tied at 20 Grand Slam singles titles, more than any other man in the history of tennis. There won’t be a chance at 21 this week.