Both Jannik Sinner and Sebastian Korda have taken huge steps in their careers over the past year. They took another one on Tuesday at the Miami Open.
Both Sinner and Korda are through to the quarterfinals of a Masters 1000 event for the first time ever following respective fourth-round victories. After Sinner erased fellow rising star Emil Ruusuvuori 6-3, 6-2, Korda upset No. 5 seed Diego Schwartzman 6-3, 4-6, 7-5.
Sinner’s success was never in doubt. The 19-year-old Italian converted all four of his break-point opportunities to advance in just one hour and nine minutes. He took advantage of an opponent who was coming off three consecutive three-set victories.
“For me it means a lot,” Sinner assured. “The first goal is always trying to improve day after day, going on practice courts, and then when you have sometimes good results it makes you happy. I’m very happy about that and obviously I’m looking forward to tough matches here.”
Korda certainly had a tough one in round four. The 20-year-old American survived a roller-coaster ride against Schwartzman after two hours and 35 minutes. After splitting the first two sets, Korda failed to serve it out at 5-4 in the third–squandering one match point in the process. The world No. 87 immediately got another chance at 6-5, and this time he sealed the deal with ease.
“He made it tough,” Korda said of Schwartzman. “In that first set I served super hot; he didn’t serve that well. But then he picked it up and he was just fighting and he was playing some really good tennis after that, and then the third set was just a battle.”
Next up for Korda is Andrey Rublev, without question one of the favorites for the title. Sinner will go up against Alexander Bublik, a three-set winner over Taylor Fritz.
Bublik is also into a Masters 1000 quarterfinal for the first time in his career.
nice one, kids