Jodar beats Fils again to reach his first Masters 1000 semi-final
Rafael Jodar beat Arthur Fils 7-6 (5), 6-3, saving off three match points against him in a chaotic final game, to reach his first Masters 1000 semi-final.
Rafael Jodar, Montreal 2026 | © Zuma / PsNewz
Spaniard Rafael Jodar, the No. 20 seed, beat Frenchman Arthur Fils, the No. 18 seed, 7-6 (5), 6-3 in 1 hour 42 minutes to reach the semi-finals of the Montreal Masters 1000 on Tuesday evening, his first appearance in the final four at Masters 1000 level.
Jodar, ranked No. 15, will play American Brandon Nakashima, the No. 28 seed, next.
The second set alone told the story of how hard-fought the win was. Fils held to open it, Jodar leveled, then broke to lead 2-1 before Fils broke straight back to level again at 2-2. Fils held for 3-2, Jodar held for 3-3, then broke again to lead 4-3 and held through a deuce-strewn game to 5-3. Serving to stay in the match, Fils saved three match points across a game that swung through four separate deuces before Jodar finally broke to close it out 6-3.
The stat sheet reflected the scrap: Jodar converted four of 12 break points to Fils’s two from four. Jodar finished with 20 winners to Fils’s 18 against 34 unforced errors to 28.
The win was Jodar’s second over Fils in a matter of weeks, having also beaten the Frenchman in the third round in Washington. It extended his run to 29 wins in his last 35 matches and confirmed what has already been one of the most remarkable rookie seasons on tour: the 19-year-old began 2026 ranked No. 168, has since captured his first title in Marrakech, reached the Washington final and now a Masters 1000 semi-final, all in his teenage year, and did it here on a hard court rather than the clay where he made his name.
A win over Nakashima would move him to No. 11 in the ATP Live Rankings and make him the 11th teenager to reach the men’s semi-finals at this event in the Open Era.
Fils’s fitness
Jodar had beaten No. 8 seed Jiri Lehecka of the Czech Republic 6-3, 6-3, No. 11 seed Lorenzo Musetti of Italy 6-4, 6-3 and Frenchman Corentin Moutet 4-6, 6-1, 6-3 to reach the quarters. Fils, ranked No. 24, had been chasing his third Masters 1000 semi-final of the season, after Miami and Madrid, and a place alongside Guy Forget as the only Frenchman to reach three at this level in a season since 1990.
He had beaten Englishman Cameron Norrie 6-2, 7-6 (8), Argentina’s Mariano Navone 6-3, 6-2 and American Zachary Svajda 6-4, 3-6, 6-1 to reach the quarters. The run came with a caveat worth noting: Fils had called for the trainer with a back issue during their Washington final only weeks earlier, the same complaint that limited him to a single tournament, Wimbledon, between Rome and this North American hard-court swing. Reaching the Montreal quarter-finals while carrying that fitness question mark is a kind of victory.
