Darderi ends Borges’s run to reach maiden Masters 1000 quarter-final on hard courts
Luciano Darderi beat Nuno Borges 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 to reach his first hard-court Masters 1000 quarter-final and become the first man on tour to log 10 quarter-finals in 2026, denying the Portuguese a maiden last-eight run at this level.
Luciano Darderi, Montreal 2026 | © Zuma / PsNewz
Italian Luciano Darderi, the No. 19 seed, edged out Portuguese Nuno Borges 4-6, 6-3, 7-5 to reach the quarter-finals of the National Bank Open presented by Rogers on Saturday evening, his first Masters 1000 last-eight appearance on a hard court.
Darderi, ranked No. 22, will face the winner of the match between Frenchman Arthur Rinderknech, the No. 23 seed, and American Brandon Nakashima, the No. 28 seed, next.
It was the second time in less than a month that Darderi had beaten Borges, having also won their previous meeting 7-6 (9), 6-4 in the Bastad final in July, a result that leveled their ATP Tour head-to-head at 2-2.
The win was also the 24-year-old’s 30th of the season, matching his career-best win tally from 2025 with almost five months of the season still to play, and made him the first man on tour to reach 10 quarter-finals in 2026, moving ahead of Alexander Zverev, with whom he had been tied at nine.
Darderi built his run through the draw on the same form that carried him to a breakthrough at the Rome Masters in May, where he saved four match points against then-No. 3 Zverev to reach his first Masters 1000 quarter-final and semi-final, on clay. He arrived in Montreal having beaten Chinese Juncheng Shang 4-6, 6-1, 6-4 and benefited from Canadian Gabriel Diallo’s retirement while trailing 6-4, 2-3.
Borges, ranked No. 49, had been chasing what would have been the biggest quarter-final of his career and a chance to become just the third Portuguese man to reach the last eight of a Masters 1000 event, after Frederico Gil at Monte-Carlo in 2011 and Joao Sousa at Madrid in 2016, and the first to do so on a hard court.
The 29-year-old had beaten German Yannick Hanfmann 6-4, 6-2, No. 26 seed Tomas Martin Etcheverry of Argentina 6-4, 6-2 and American Aleksandar Kovacevic 6-7 (7), 6-2, 6-4 to reach the fourth round.
