Four and a half hours after his US Open second round match was scheduled to start, Britain’s Dan Evans unfurled an overhead winner to beat Marcos Giron of the US 6-4, 7-6, 2-6, 6-3.
The contest was delayed by rain which refused to move from the New York skies and caused disruptions throughout, resulting in the late finish.
But when the pair were on the court, Britain’s top ranked and now last remaining male player looked comfortable despite wobbling in the third set with some uncharacteristic errors. That allowed the American to reduce the deficit, but the result looked a sure thing early on as Evans capitalised on Giron’s mistakes.
Evans, 31, has never progressed beyond the third round of this final Grand Slam of the year and will meet Australia’s Alexei Popyrin who enjoyed a walkover after 15th seed Grigor Dimitrov from Bulgaria retired.
However, the Aussie was two sets up so Evans will have his work cut out for him despite sitting 46 places above Popyrin on the ATP world rankings.
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