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Comeback king Arthur Fery stuns Dimitrov to reach Wimbledon quarter-finals
His 7-5, 3-6, 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 win made him the first male British wild card in the Open era to reach a major quarter-final.
The dream goes on for Arthur Fery, the miracle man who has just become the most unlikely Wimbledon quarter-finalist Britain has ever produced.
When a player ranked outside the world’s top 100 reaches the last eight of this tournament, it’s normally an experienced campaigner who has been sidelined by injury – just like Fery’s fourth-round opponent Grigor Dimitrov.
But to come here and win four rounds as a virtual novice – as world No 114 Fery has done over the last week – is simply not the sort of thing that happens in pro tennis. It feels, whisper it, Raducanu-esque.
Even Peter Colt, fictional hero of Wimbledon the movie, had been a former top-20 player who recovered his form with the help of Kirsten Dunst’s love interest. So Fery’s run could genuinely be described as stranger than fiction.
Just to add to the feverish feeling on Centre Court on Monday, Roger Federer was sitting in the middle of the Royal Box while Fery ousted Dimitrov – the man whose silky single-handed backhand earned him the nickname of “Baby Fed” – with a display of astonishing guts and skill.
The extraordinary thing about Fery is that he seems completely impervious to pressure. Actually, that’s not the right phrase. Fery actively responds to pressure – but in the opposite direction to most players of his youth and inexperience. The bigger the point, the better he plays it.
There were times during this four-hour epic when it seemed that Dimitrov had finally quenched Fery’s resistance, especially when he twice led by a break in the fourth set.
But the extremity of the situation brought an even more extreme response from Fery. For a man with relatively short levers – he claims to be 5ft 9in tall but looks a couple of inches shorter – he generates extraordinary weight of shot. And now he began conjuring volley winners and unplayable returns out of nothing. For the final point of that set, Dimitrov manoeuvred himself into a strong position at the net, only for Fery to whip a fizzing backhand pass onto the sideline.
It was a similar story in the decisive 10-point tie-break. As the light faded, Dimitrov once again worked a lead at 5-4, with two serves to come, only to double-fault.
As a 35-year-old whose career has entered its twilight years, Dimitrov knows he has only a few of chances left at his favourite tournament. A cold and invisible hand seemed to grip his vitals at that moment. But Fery? The 23-year-old making his first visit to Centre Court? He responded with an ace down the middle.
What magic was this? When Dimitrov’s faltering final backhand limped into the net, the crowd rose as one to acclaim Fery in the gloaming, and the ovation lasted so long that we could have been at the Cannes Film Festival.
It is easy to forget now, but if we rewind to tea-time on Monday – when Centre Court briefly emptied for loo-breaks and refuelling after Jasmine Paolini’s win – Fery had started as a rank outsider.
Neither should we omit to mention that Dimitrov had been dominating eventual champion Jannik Sinner on this court 12 months ago, before the temperature dropped under the roof and he tore a pectoral muscle. Nor that Dimitrov is one of only three men who beat Andy Murray at Wimbledon during the peak years of his career, alongside Federer and Rafael Nadal.
For Fery – who had suffered with nosebleeds during each of his previous three wins – this was his greatest test to date. He knew that he would face a more elevated level of tennis than he is accustomed to. The air grows thinner and colder as you climb the pyramid of this sport. But he was ready to pull on the crampons.
Admittedly, Fery barely laid a glove on Dimitrov in the first half-hour, only finally winning a point against serve in the 27th minute. But he had been here before. Outgunned by Otto Virtanen in the second round, trailing to Zizou Bergs in the third, Fery had revealed the unflappable character that distinguishes his play as much as his sweetly struck backhand.
Now, on the most famous stage of all, he showed it again. The 11th game of that first set – in which Fery moved into the lead for the first time by breaking the Dimitrov serve to love – was as good as any he has played, converted when he lunged into a forehand return with the conviction of a baseballer striking a home run.
And even though the crowd might have gone a little flat when Dimitrov hit back by winning sets two and three – before claiming an apparently decisive lead in the fourth – you still have to win the last point. Which Fery did triumphantly. His 7-5, 3-6, 4-6, 6-4, 7-6 win made him the first male British wild card in the Open era to reach a major quarter-final.
It wasn’t only Centre Court that lost its marbles in that moment. The grassy knoll at the top of the Wimbledon footprint erupted like a volcano. After Henman Hill and Murray Mound, some are already suggesting Fery Field – although Arthur’s Seat could be another contender.
Next up is Flavio Cobolli, the Italian whom Fery beat in the first round of January’s Australian Open– even if Cobolli had a stomach bug at the time.
Still, this isn’t the time to look ahead; but rather, to enjoy the story. In a year in which Jack Draper and Emma Raducanu withdrew from Wimbledon, Britain was looking for a flag-carrier to get behind
And at the end of a wonderful 24 hours for English sport, tennis lovers have found the hero we needed.
[Source: Daily Telegraph]
