ATP Barcelona: Dominic Thiem beats Guido Pella, now against Rafael Nadal
Dominic Thiem is in the semi-finals of the ATP Tour 500 tournament in Barcelona after a two-set win against Guido Pella. There Thiem meets defending champion Rafael Nadal.
by Jens Huiber
last edit: Apr 26, 2019, 08:45 pm
Dominic Thiem can again measure himself against Rafael Nadal: The Austrian number one increased by the minute in his quarter-finals at the ATP Tour 500 tournament in Barcelona, playing opponent Guido Pella more and more tired. In the first set, the Argentine was able to come back briefly after a break in the break, but ended up being 7: 5 and 6: 2 for the Austrian number one. In the final round on Saturday, Thiem will meet Rafael Nadal (live on Sky, in Austria on ServusTV and in our live ticker). He had more problems than expected in the 7-5, 7-5 against Jan-Lennard Struff.
In the fifth encounter with Pella, Thiem put pressure from the start, but the Argentine excelled on the defensive again and again. The third-placed Lichtenwörther managed the first break of the match to 4: 3, but had to give up his serve immediately. After 62 minutes of play, however, Thiem successfully completed the first act.
Legendary match against Rafael Nadal at the US Open
In set two Thiem presented with a double break, had some problems with his own serve to 5: 1. Pella held out again, but after a total of 1:40 hours of play Thiem left the court as the winner.
Dominic Thiem has played eleven matches against Rafael Nadal so far, three of them won. The most recent encounter has gone down in recent tennis history as an instant classic: in the quarter-finals of the 2018 US Open, Nadal prevailed in the tiebreaker of the fifth set. The two opponents met in Barcelona in the final in 2017. At that time, Nadal won 6: 4 and 6: 1.