Vienna Open: Tiafoe outlasts Monfils in late-night thriller

American Frances Tiafoe, the No 7 seed, edged out Frenchman Gael Monfils 5-7, 6-1, 6-4 to advance to the last 8 of the Vienna Open at the Wiener Stadthalle on Thursday evening.

In what was a back and forth match, Monfils won an arm-wrestle of a first set, before completely going away in the second. The 37-year-old appeared to be having significant issues with his right calf, causing the Frenchman to have limited mobility and fall behind 5-0.

Monfils clawed his way back into the match, however, taking the third set deep before Tiafoe grabbed a late break of serve to close out the round of 16 clash.

ATP Finals implications for Tiafoe

With the victory, Tiafoe keeps his slim Nitto ATP Finals hopes alive, moving to 14th in the race ahead of Karen Khachanov and Ben Shelton. If the American is to have any chance of qualifying, he’ll need to continue winning this week, and claim his inaugural Masters 1000 title in Paris as well.

Tiafoe, ranked No 14, will face second seed Jannik Sinner next.

The American benefited from the retirement of Daniel Evans (1-4) in the previous round of the Vienna tournament, while in the first round of the Vienna tournament, Monfils, ranked No 89, beat German Daniel Altmaier (6-4, 6-4).

Vienna ATP500, other second-round results (Wiener Stadthalle, EUR 2.409.835, most recent results first):

• Jannik Sinner beat Lorenzo Sonego (LL): 6-2, 6-4
• Stefanos Tsitsipas (4) beat Tomas Machac (Q): 6-3, 4-6, 7-5
• Daniil Medvedev (1) beat Grigor Dimitrov: 3-6, 6-2, 6-4
• Borna Gojo (WC) beat Tommy Paul (6): 6-3, 6-4
• Andrey Rublev (3) beat Matteo Arnaldi: 7-5, 6-3
• Alexander Zverev (5) beat Cameron Norrie: 6-2, 6-4
• Karen Khachanov (8) beat Jiri Lehecka: 6-3, 6-1