American Taylor Fritz progressed to the Wimbledon quarterfinals Sunday for a second consecutive year after Australia’s Jordan Thompson retired due to injury with the No. 5 seed leading 6-1, 3-0.
With Fritz advancing, it’s the fifth consecutive major that at least one American man has made the quarterfinals — the longest streak for the U.S. men since a run of six straight from the 2002 US Open to 2004 Australian Open.
“Not the way I wanted to go through, I was excited to play Jordan today, I was excited to play good tennis,” Fritz said. “It’s sad … he’s been battling out here, playing five-setters, I respect him for coming out … I feel bad for him and I hope he gets better.”
Thompson has had a couple retirements at majors before, most recently the 2023 US Open against Botic Van De Zandschulp, due to a leg injury. He was also forced to exit his 2021 Australian Open match against Casper Ruud with a shoulder injury.
Fritz joins Frances Tiafoe as the only American men to reach at least one major quarterfinal each of the past four years, tying the longest such streak by U.S. men since Andy Roddick from 2001-11 (11 straight years).
Fritz and Ben Shelton, who advanced to the round of 16 with his straight-sets win Saturday, are the only Americans remaining in the men’s singles draw. Looking ahead, only two American men in the past 15 years have reached the Wimbledon semifinals: Sam Querrey in 2017 and John Isner in 2018.
Fritz, the US Open runner-up last year, will face No. 17 seed Karen Khachanov in the quarterfinals.
Khachanov, from Russia, reached his second Wimbledon quarterfinal by beating Kamil Majchrzak 6-4, 6-2, 6-3 earlier Sunday.
“To be honest, today was a really great performance — at least from my side,” said Khachanov, who finished with more than twice as many winners as unforced errors, 44-21.
Khachanov has been a Grand Slam semifinalist twice, at the US Open in 2022 and the Australian Open in 2023. He was a quarterfinalist at the All England Club four years ago.
The 109th-ranked Majchrzak was playing in a fourth-round match at a major for the first time. He was on a six-match Grand Slam losing streak before Wimbledon.
Other men’s matches later were two-time defending champion Carlos Alcaraz vs. No. 14 Andrey Rublev, and Nicolas Jarry vs. Cam Norrie.
ESPN Research, The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.
