Luxembourg’s Gilles Muller produced an astonishing Houdini act to reach the quarterfinals of the ATP Aegon championships, saving 10 match points to beat seventh seed John Isner 3-6, 7-6(16), 7-6(7) here on Thursday.
Muller, ranked 41, came through a marathon second-set tiebreak 18-16 having lost the opener and edged the deciding set tiebreaker 9-7 to seal an unlikely victory.
American Isner launched 43 aces but Muller, who banged down 26 of his own, refused to bow down. His escape was only one short of the ATP record for match points saved in a victory.
Easy for Murray It was far more straightforward for top seed Andy Murray who eased past fellow Briton Aljaz Bedene 6-3, 6-4.
The 29-year-old Murray required a single break of serve to take the opening set and recovered from a minor wobble in the second to subdue the Slovenia-born Bedene and book another all-British clash with wildcard Kyle Edmund.
The results:
At London: ATP Aegon championships: Second round: Gilles Muller bt John Isner 3-6, 7-6(16), 7-6(7); Andy Murray bt Aljaz Bedene 6-3, 6-4; Kyle Edmund w/o Paul-Henri Mathieu; Steve Johnson bt Adrian Mannarino 4-6, 6-3, 6-4; Marin Cilic bt Janko Tipsarevic 6-4, 6-2.
First round: Kyle Edmund bt Gilles Simon 6-4, 3-6, 6-1; Paul-Henri Mathieu bt Daniel Evans 7-6(8), 6-7(6), 6-3; John Isner bt Juan Martin del Potro 7-6(2), 6-4.
At Halle: ATP Gerry Weber Open: Second round: Marcos Baghdatis bt Dustin Brown 7-5, 7-6(8); Alexander Zverev bt Benjamin Becker 7-5, 3-0 (retired); Andreas Seppi bt Yuichi Sugita 6-3, 6-0.
First round: Teimuraz Gabashvili bt Paolo Lorenzi 6-1, 6-4.
Dominic Thiem bt Joao Sousa 7-5, 6-4.
