In a dramatic day of quarter-final doubles action at the Serbia Open, all three matches went the distance and one seeded team was sent home.

Top seeds Nikola Mektic and Mate Pavic survived a Match Tie-break to knock off home favourites Ivan Sabanov and Matej Sabanov, while third seeds Max Purcell and Matthew Ebden missed out on two match points in a loss against Tomislav Brkic and Nikola Cacic.

Mektic and Pavic came from behind against Serbia’s Sabanov twins to advance to the semi-finals, 2-6, 6-3, 10-4. The established Croatian pairing is seeking its first ATP Tour title of 2022, after falling one point short in the Dubai final in February, when the duo held three championship points against Tim Puetz and Michael Venus.

They’ll face Hugo Nys and Jan Zielinski as they bid for their second final of the year, after the Monagesque-Polish pairing defeated Ben McLachlan and Andre Goransson, 6-3, 3-6, 10-7.

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Ebden and Purcell, champions in Houston earlier this month, saw their win streak snapped at five after a 3-6, 7-6(9), 10-4 result. The Aussies could not serve out the match at 6-5 in the second, then had two match points go begging at 6-4 in the tie-break. 

Brkick and Cacic dominated the Match Tie-break, winning the first three points and racing to a 9-2 lead before closing it out on their third match point. Both men were born in Bosnia-Herzegovina, with Cacic playing under the Serbian flag.

For the second straight day at the Serbia Open, Novak Djokovic won a comeback three-setter against an in-form countryman. The World No. 1 again battled back from a set and a break down Thursday against Miomir Kecmanovic to advance to the semi-finals in his native Belgrade, 4-6, 6-3, 6-3.

Djokovic extended his win streak against Serbians to 10 matches, improving his record to 27-4 against his countrymen and 36-6 in his home nation.

“The scenario was similar to last evening’s match, but I managed to win and qualify for the semis,” Djokovic said in Serbian in his post-match interview. “Thanks to my team, I felt better than last night.”

Switching to English, he later added: “It’s a very strange feeling, sharing the court with your compatriots. Obviously the crowd was phenomenal for both players in yesterday’s match and today. They’re very rare occasions when I’m able to play at home and experience this atmosphere, so I’m trying to enjoy every single moment.”

After working through some early struggles and coming to grips with Kecmanovic’s aggressive game, the top seed played some of the best tennis of his limited season in the latter half of the match.

Kecmanovic took the opening set without facing a break point, before an eventful start to the second saw a break chance in each of the first four games. After sitting down for the first changeover down a break, Djokovic began to elevate his precision and consistency from the baseline to level the match.

He redlined in the final game of the two-hour, 18-minute contest, sealing his fourth break of serve with consecutive backhand winners. He won the final four games of the deciding set, dropping just two points in the process, and did not face a break point in the stanza.

Djokovic was happy with the way he held up physically in his opening match, a nearly three-and-a-half hour win against Laslo Djere. With less than 24 hours to rest, he was again up to the task on Thursday, improving as the match wore on.

The victory is a repeat of the result when Djokovic and Kecmanovic met at the same stage one year ago in Belgrade, with Djokovic now holding a 2-0 ATP Head2Head edge in their series. The 22-year-old Kecmanovic has been one of the most consistent players of the 2022 season. Now at a career-high of No. 38 in the ATP Rankings, he was playing in his fifth consecutive ATP Tour quarter-final. The loss drops him to 19-8 on the year.

Djokovic, chasing a third title at the Serbia Open and a fourth ATP Tour title overall in his home city, awaits the winner of third seed Karen Khachanov’s match against Brazilian qualifier Thiago Monteiro.

“I’m very pleased that I’m not going to play a Serbian player,” Djokovic said with a smile. “That’s going to be very nice for a change.”

Another day, another big test for one of the top seeds at the Serbia Open.

Less than 24 hours after Novak Djokovic was pushed to the brink in Belgrade, second seed Andrey Rublev rallied past #NextGenATP Czech Jiri Lehecka 4-6, 7-6(1), 6-2 after two hours and seven minutes to reach the quarter-finals. He will next play #NextGenATP Dane Holger Rune or Japan’s Taro Daniel.

“It’s a bit tough conditions here to play and it was my first match, plus the guy who I played, he played amazing. He’s a young guy and he played through qualies, through the first round, so he got used to the conditions and he started really well,” Rublev said during his on-court interview. “I was a bit tight and the first match is not easy. But then, with time I started to adapt and I started to play better and better and in the end I finished the match on a good level.”

Rublev faced one break point in each of the second and third sets, but was not in quite the same level of difficulty as Djokovic was on Wednesday against Laslo Djere. The 24-year-old raced out to a quick start in the second-set tie-break and never looked back.

“It’s not easy because everyone is playing at a good level and you can see today I was really close to losing my first match. It’s not easy now because the guys, they improve. They play better and better,” Rublev said. “I hope I’m going to do my best tomorrow, I hope I will show a great matchn and we’ll see what’s going to happen.”

In other second-round matches, sixth seed Fabio Fognini set a quarter-final clash against German Oscar Otte. Fognini defeated Slovenian Aljaz Bedene 6-2, 6-3 and Otte upset fourth seed Aslan Karatsev 6-7(4), 6-1, 6-3.

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Rublev, who has already won hard-court titles this season in Marseille and Dubai, is pursuing his first clay-court trophy since Hamburg in 2020.

Novak Djokovic demonstrated all of his battling qualities to overcome a slow start against fellow Serb Laslo Djere and complete a dramatic second-round comeback at the Serbia Open in Belgrade on Wednesday.

The World No. 1 struggled to find his best level for much of his maiden tour-level meeting with Djere, but the 20-time Grand Slam champion dug deep to clinch a 2-6, 7-6(6), 7-6(4) win and keep his hopes of a third title at the ATP 250 event alive at the Novak Tennis Center.

“I liked the way I managed to physically hold on and push through and survive a thriller of almost three-and-a-half hours,” Djokovic said post-match. “That’s the positive difference compared to Monte Carlo, where I just wasn’t able to physically sustain the third set. Today, that was different. If there are positives, I think that’s the one.”

“Playing an official match in front of your crowd… you feel the great support, which I had, and I’m very grateful for that. But at the same time, it’s not simple. Even after so many years of experience and playing many times in front of the home crowd, you still feel nervous.”

Just like in his loss in Monaco against Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, Djokovic was slow out the blocks, but this time he found his range in time to stay with his opponent and eventually overhauled Djere in a three-hour, 22-minute marathon.

Djokovic could not match a strong start from the World No. 50 as Djere carved out break point opportunities in all four of the top seed’s service games in the opening set. Converting two of them was enough for Djere to take the set, as he struck the ball powerfully against an opponent struggling to settle in just his fifth match of 2022.

“I think Djere, for most of the match, was the better player,” Djokovic said. “He was the one controlling the game. He was the one attacking. I didn’t feel great again in terms of my game. I had a very bad match with my serve, kind of ups and downs really.”

Djokovic upped his level in the second set and let out a roar after reclaiming a break to level at 4-4 as the crowd began to anticipate a trademark comeback from the legendary 34-year-old. He missed three set points in the 12th game but recovered from that disappointment to clinch the tie-break to force a decider.

Djokovic was never at his imperious best but stayed solid off both wings and took a nervy final set in a tie-break despite stubborn resistance from a tiring Djere, who produced a high-class performance as he came close to the biggest win of his career. The World No. 50 will nonetheless rue a couple of costly misses at crucial moments. He netted a short forehand into an open court when serving at 4-3, 40/15 to let Djokovic back into the second set, and then missed a similar forehand when 4/3 ahead in the third-set tie-break.

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With the win, Djokovic improved his record against Serbian opponents to 26-4. He has not lost to a countryman since defeat to Janko Tipsarevic in Madrid in 2012.

“It was a little bit [of a] strange feeling playing against another Serbian player, which will be the case again tomorrow,” he said. “But I must say the crowd was outstanding.”

Djokovic’s next opponent will be Miomir Kecmanovic, who earlier completed a 6-4, 7-6(5) win over Australian John Millman to reach the quarter-finals for the second year in a row. Djokovic leads the pair’s ATP Head2Head series 1-0 after defeating Kecmanovic in the quarter-finals in Belgrade in 2021.

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