'Defeat will stay with me forever,' says devastated Thiem

Dominic Thiem said his epic defeat to close friend Rafael Nadal in the US Open quarter-finals will "stay with me forever".

Defending champion Nadal downed battling ninth seed Thiem 0-6, 6-4, 7-5, 6-7 (4/7), 7-6 (7/5) to reach the semi-finals for the seventh time.

In a gripping 4-hour 49-minute contest, which concluded at 2.04 a.m. on Wednesday, world number one Nadal won through to keep his bid for a fourth title in New York and 18th Grand Slam crown on track.

"It's going to be stuck in my mind forever. Forever I'm going to remember this match, for sure," said Thiem after his first ever hard court match against Nadal.

"Tennis is cruel sometimes because I think this match didn't really deserve a loser. But there has to be one.

"It ended up in the fifth set tiebreaker, there it's 50/50. He made one more point than me."
"I think we almost all the time have great matches. I hope that we have many more in the future -- with a different end."