Wife-husband duo Elina Svitolina and Gaël Monfils win on the same court at the Australian Open

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Gaël Monfils joined Roger Federer as the only men to reach the fourth round of the Australian Open at age 38 or older since the tournament expanded to 128 players in 1988, returning to beat No. 4 seed Taylor Fritz 3. -6, 7-5, 7-6 (1), 6-4 on Saturday.

And after that victory, Monfils returned to Margaret Court Arena and sat in the stands to watch his wife, Elina Svitolina, knock out the women’s No. 4 seed, two-time major finalist Jasmine Paolini 2-6, 6 -4, 6-0. at night.

“I warmed up the field for her,” Monfils said with a smile.

His opinion?

“I was inspired by my husband’s victory,” Svitolina said. “I looked around for a bit.”

After punctuating his victory with a 135 mph ace – his 24 of the afternoon, doubling Fritz’s total – Monfils performed a celebratory dance on the baseline as thousands of fans roared, many waving red, white and blue French flags.

“It was really hard to hurt him. He just got everything back,” Fritz said. “It felt like I wasn’t even hitting. …It almost seemed too easy for him to hurt me, considering how hard I was struggling to hurt him. He played really well. I couldn’t do much.

Monfils began his season with a title at a hard-court event in Auckland, New Zealand, which made him the oldest man to win a tournament since at least 1990.

“Just luck.” But every day is different. We work hard. I try to be very disciplined with recovery. I strongly believe in myself. I firmly believe I can do damage,” said Monfils, who has never progressed past the quarterfinals of the Australian Open but has reached two major semifinals, most recently at the US Open 2016. “Hopefully, here we are in week two of the Australian Open.”

Federer was a slightly older 38 when he reached the semi-finals at Melbourne Park in 2020, which turned out to be his last tournament appearance.

Monfils will next face a much younger opponent, 22-year-old Ben Shelton, the 21st-seeded American who eliminated 16th-seeded Italian Lorenzo Musetti 6-3, 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (5 ).

Playing his usual style of charismatic and entertaining tennis in front of a raucous crowd on Saturday, Monfils compiled an impressive ratio of 58 winners to 34 unforced errors and lost only one service game. And while Monfils won 11 of the 15 points he scored at the net, Fritz scored just 16 of 30 when he pushed forward.

“I did the job,” Monfils said.

Fritz, 27, runner-up to Jannik Sinner at the US Open in September, emerged as the favorite to come out of the group at Melbourne Park this year. Fritz’s right foot was treated by a trainer during the match.

This result ended Monfils’ 12-game losing streak against the top five players at Grand Slam tournaments.

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Howard Fendrich has been the AP’s tennis editor since 2002. Find his stories here: https://apnews.com/author/howard-fendrich. More AP tennis: https://apnews.com/hub/tennis