Andrey Rublev left red-faced in Aus Open blunder after ‘anyone but Djokovic’ comment | Tennis | Sport

But Rublev played down his chances against Djokovic in a potential meeting after forgetting to mention de Minaur, as he reached the seventh quarter-final of his career and was told by Fitzgerland that he would eventually get through to his first semi-final if he kept plugging away. “We’ll see, I don’t know man,” he responded.

“I’m just happy that I was able to win this match and I want to enjoy this evening so we’ll see what’s going to happen next.” Meanwhile, Rune told reporters that he would have relished the chance to face the fourth seed if he had been able to defeat Rublev.

Speaking after the three-hour-and-37-minute match, the world No 10 said: “I would have wanted to play Djokovic. Obviously we’ll have to see if he wins. De Minaur is super pumped. It’s his home tournament. I think it’s going to be a tricky match. But Novak, he comes up with incredible tennis when it matters. This is why he’s so good. So it’s going to be for sure interesting match. It wouldn’t surprise me if Novak is in the quarters, for sure.”