Milos Raonic became the first Canadian man to reach the Australian Open quarter-finals in 47 years with a five-set win over Feliciano Lopez on Monday
The eighth seed thundered down 30 aces as he made the last eight with a 6-4, 4-6, 6-3, 6-7 (7/9) 6-3 win over 12th-seeded Lopez in 3hr5min on Hisense Arena.
Next up will be a quarter-final against either world number one and four-time champion Novak Djokovic or Luxembourg's Gilles Muller on Wednesday.
Raonic created Canadian tennis history by becoming the first man since Michael Belkin in 1968 to win through to the quarters at the Australian Open.
He also equalled countryman Robert Powell's feat of playing in three Grand Slam quarter-finals set back at the 1908, 1910 and 1912 Wimbledons.
The big-serving 24-year-old, who reached the semi-finals at last year's Wimbledon, had two match points saved when he was serving for victory in the fourth set.
Lopez took it to a fifth set, but Raonic broke the Spaniard in the eighth game and then blasted three straight aces on the way to serving it out in the following game.
"It's great to be here in the second week, there was some great tennis played today and I just think that is only going to get better," Raonic said.
Raonic hit an extraordinary 81 winners and first served at 75 percent, winning 79 percent. His monster serve was only broken once by Lopez.
Source: AFP
