British players Cameron Norrie and Daniel Evans took contrasting paths to make it to the last eight stage of the 2019 Atlanta Open.
While Norrie defeated Kwon Soon-woo 6-3, 6-4 in his second round match on Wednesday, Evans needed three sets to overcome Moldovan Radu Albot to enter the quarter-final round in Atlanta late last evening.
Interestingly, it was Norrie who had been stretched to three sets in his opening round victory over Jordan Thompson while Evans had registered a 6-1, 6-1 win over Jason Jung in his first round match.
Evans is coming off a reasonable performance at the 2019 Wimbledon where he made it to the third round before losing in a five-set thriller to Joao Sousa. Interestingly, he had beaten Albot in the first round at Eastbourne earlier too, a competition where he made it to the quarter-final stage as well.
He had prepared for his grass court swing with back to back title wins on the Challenger circuit, scooping the Surbiton and Nottingham Challenger in the process. Evans will now take on Reilly Opelka in the last eight after the American overcame top-seeded John Isner in three tie-breakers.
Norrie’s performance in Atlanta will come as a huge relief for him after the recent showings left him short-changed. Since the Monte-Carlo Masters in April, Norrie hasn’t won two matches in a row in the main draw of any competition – and he’s participated in seven competitions before Atlanta.
This included a first round loss at the French Open and a second round defeat at Wimbledon.
Norrie’s next opponent will be Alexei Popyrin, an Aussie who defeated the fourth seeded Pierre-Hugues Herbert in his second round match.
Some of the other players still in action at the Atlanta Open include Taylor Fritz, Alex de Minaur and Ugo Humbert.
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