Top seeds Murray, Kerber ousted from Australian Open

With reigning champion Novak Djokovic having been knocked out in the second round, a Grand Slam will head into the second week without its top two men’s seeds for the first time since the 2004 French Open. German Zverev, in the fourth round at a Grand Slam for the first time after a career ravaged by injury, flummoxed his contemporary with his unorthodox serve-volley game and broke the Wimbledon and Olympic champion eight times over the contest. 

The world number 50 was helped by a below-par performance from Murray but thoroughly deserved his 7-5 5-7 6-2 6-4 victory over three and a half hours on Rod Laver Arena, which earned him a quarter-final meeting with Roger Federer. “He deserved to win because he played great when he was down and also in the important moments,” said Briton Murray. 

“(He) kept coming up with great shots, there’s not too much you can do about that. Sometimes you got to say, ‘well played’. It was obviously disappointing to lose. But he did some good stuff out there.” Murray prides himself on the variety of weapons at his disposal but some, like his lob, deserted him on Sunday, while others were undermined by the lack of pace Zverev offered him to work with. Zverev served solidly and came up with 52 winners, charging the net 118 times and breaking the world number one five times in the first two sets alone.

The German world number one’s exit followed that of men’s top seed and world number one Andy Murray, who lost to Mischa Zverev earlier in the evening on the same court.The 25-year-old New Yorker claimed a place in the quarter-finals at Melbourne Park for the first time, blasting six aces and 30 winners to overpower Kerber.

The world number 35 smashed a backhand crosscourt winner to take the single break of serve she needed to claim the opening set in 33 minutes. Kerber, who also won the U.S. Open last year, hit back by breaking her American opponent on a double fault in the opening game of the second set but Vandeweghe would not be denied. 

Taking advantage of a series of uncharacteristic Kerber errors, Vandeweghe ramped up her big forehand to break back for 3-3 and another backhand gave her the opportunity to serve for the match.