Tiafoe: 'I Woke Up This Morning & Knew I'd Beat Tsitsipas'
Frances Tiafoe likes the big stage. So much so that the American knew today was going to be his day at Wimbledon from the moment he woke up.
The 23-year-old American recorded his first win over a Top 5 player on Monday with a 6-4, 6-4, 6-3 victory over third-seeded Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas on No. 1 Court.
“I woke up this morning like, ‘Yeah, I'm beating Stefanos’," said Tiafoe, after the fourth Top 10 win of his career. "It’s happened. I think believing it when nobody else does is so big.
“Once I saw the draw coming out, [I thought] these are matches I actually love. I think a lot of guys in the tennis community know that. I play great tennis against high-calibre players.”
Tiafoe pumped himself up for his first win in his fourth ATP Head2Head meeting against Tsitsipas, the recent Roland Garros finalist (l. to Djokovic), by walking onto the show court listening to “Steve Angello [and] the song called ‘Rejoice’, featuring T.D. Jakes.”
Tiafoe, who first played on a grass court in Washington, D.C., at the age of 14, believes that playing on the natural surface helps his game.
“It forces me to play the right way,” said Tiafoe, who reached the cinch Championships quarter-finals (l. to Shapovalov) two weeks ago. “It forces me to play super aggressive. It forces me to be off my front foot on both sides, it forces me to come to the net, because otherwise you're vulnerable.”
Tiafoe’s previous-best result had come in beating then World No. 6 Kevin Anderson in the 2019 Australian Open second round en route to the quarter-finals (l. to Nadal).
The World No. 56 will next challenge Canada’s Vasek Pospisil in the Wimbledon second round on Wednesday. Pospisil lost just nine of his first-service points (41/50) and struck 18 aces to beat Roberto Carballes Baena of Spain in one hour and 44 minutes.