Alex De Minaur leaves the court following his win over Arthur Fils
Alex De Minaur pulled out of his Wimbledon quarter-final against seven-time champion Novak Djokovic due to a hip injury and admitted: “I am devastated.”
The Australian ninth seed had been hoping to bid for his first last-four appearance in a major.
But the ninth seed sustained damage to his joint on match point in beating Arthur Fils in the fourth round.
The 25-year-old said: “Obviously not an announcement I wanted to make by any means. I am devastated to pull out due to a hip injury, a little tear of the fibre cartilage that kind of is at the end of or connects to the adductor.
“I felt a loud crack during the last three points of my match against Fils and got a scan yesterday (9th July) and it confirmed that this was the injury and with high risk of making it worse if I was to step on court.”
De Minaur had been also been hoping to exploit his role of honorary Brit with him being the boyfriend of home No.1 Katie Boulter.
He said after the Fils victory on Monday: “I do feel very loved out there. I always love coming here to Wimbledon and playing, here. I always feel like I play some of my best tennis. Over the years I feel like the support I’ve had has grown significantly.
‘It’s a great feeling as a player to know you’ve got a lot of people in that stadium backing you in, having your back when essentially, you’re so far away from home.
“Over the years I’ve learnt a lot more about the British culture thanks to Katie. I’m getting there.’
