Roger Federer's latest reign atop the world rankings will end after the Swiss great's shock loss to Australian qualifier Thanasi Kokkinakis in the second round of the Miami Masters.
Kokkinakis, ranked 175th in the world, needed a wild card just to get into qualifying. But he showed nerves of steel in a 3-6, 6-3, 7-6 (7/4) triumph over 20-time Grand Slam champion Federer.
"I was calmer than I thought," Kokkinakis said of the third-set tiebreaker. "Inside I was pretty happy, I was excited, but I kept pretty calm."
"Sometimes you have these matches," he said. "Sometimes you find a way through. I just couldn't get it done today."
"From that moment on, I played maybe a bad 10 minutes, which cost me the second set, maybe the match."
"In the second set I kind of used a couple of loose errors -- I started getting in the rallies more and dictating a bit with my forehand."
"When I feel like I'm playing on my terms I don't think there's too many people that can go with me Kokkinakis said. "I just needed to play my game and play aggressive tennis."
- 'Such a good role model' -
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"I've trained with him a lot of times," Kokkinakis said. "I took what I learned from him and sort of kind of knew how he played a little bit."
"I've always liked his game," he said. "I'm happy for him that on the big stage he was able to show it, center court, Miami, people watching, beating me. It's a big result for him in his career. I hope it's going to launch him, really getting his ranking up."
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