Briton Cameron Norrie defeated Russian Andrey Rublev 3-6, 6-3 and 6-4 on Saturday. first seed, and made it to the final of the inaugural San Diego Open tournament. Norrie, 26, who won his first ATP Tour title this year in Acapulco, He will face Norwegian second-seeded Casper Ruud on Sunday.
Ruud, ranked number 10 in the world, beat world number 29, Greek Grigor Dimitrov 6-4, 4-6 and 6-4 in the other semifinal. The young Norwegian tennis player eliminated former world number one and three-time Grand Slam winner, Britain’s Andy Murray in straight sets last Thursday night. Rublev, fifth in the world rankings, claimed the first set by hitting an aces of 188 kilometers per hour before 28th Norrie rallied to force a decisive third set and reach his fifth final of the year.
“It’s a great victory for me,” Norrie declared. “It is definitely a match that I will remember for a long time.“It was Norrie’s first career victory over Rublev. They last met at the St. Petersburg Open last year, where Rublev swept Norrie.”To beat someone like Andrey, who I respect and is one of my favorite players on tour, is huge for me, and also to get revenge after he easily beat me last time.Norrie commented.
“It’s good to see that I improved a bit and made it this time. Great game“Rublev had several behavioral outbursts in the second set, including throwing his racket and yelling at the refereeing team. He also seemed disturbed by the noise of planes taking off from nearby Lindbergh Field. The Russian tennis player was making his eighth appearance in the semi-finals this season.. Rublev was coming off an impressive mixed doubles Olympic gold medal performance with Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova and a Laver Cup victory.
It was Norrie’s sixth semi-final this year, setting the best semi-final appearance mark of his career. He will attempt his second ATP victory of the season. Ruud won his match when Dimitrov returned a shot to the net with an unforced error and was eliminated. The fact that both semifinals ended in three sets “shows that it has been a very tough tournament with high-level players and high-level matches.” Ruud said. “Today I think the same. It was high level from the first to the last point. Both games gave a good show to the fans who are the ones who appreciate the most that we all perform well on the field“.