Was Serena Williams' pep talk key to Dimitrov's US Open win?

p Could Serena Williams have been key to a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/grigor-dimitrov/d875/overview'Grigor Dimitrov/arsquo;s fourth-round victory at the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/us-open/560/overview'US Open/a against a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/andrey-rublev/re44/overview'Andrey Rublev/a? /p

p The 2017 a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/nitto-atp-finals/605/overview'Nitto ATP Finals/a champion revealed that he spoke to the six-time a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/us-open/560/overview'US Open/a singles champion on Saturday before a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.atptour.com/en/news/rublev-dimitrov-us-open-2024-sunday" target="_blank"triumphing in five sets on Sunday/a. The 33-year-old also discussed to what extent he gets nervous playing in front of his longtime friend. /p

p ldquo;For some reason not in front of her,rdquo; Dimitrov said. ldquo;She gave me a good pep talk yesterday. Yep, I know, exactly. Irsquo;m thrilled.rdquo; /p

blockquote class="twitter-tweet"

p lang="en" dir="ltr"???? That's what friends are for ????a href="https://twitter.com/serenawilliams?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@serenawilliams/a ???????? a href="https://twitter.com/GrigorDimitrov?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@GrigorDimitrov/a a href="https://twitter.com/usopen?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@usopen/a | a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/USOpen?src=hashamp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"#USOpen/a a href="https://t.co/lePW8PPeh8"pic.twitter.com/lePW8PPeh8/a/p

mdash; ATP Tour (@atptour) a href="https://twitter.com/atptour/status/1830343429437727088?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"September 1, 2024/a/blockquote

script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"/script

p Williams was watching from a suite alongside American singer Alicia Keys. /p

p ldquo;Itrsquo;s amazing honestly to play in front of you guys, in front of good friends and family,rdquo; Dimitrov said. ldquo;All in all itrsquo;s a tremendous atmosphere so again thank you all. Thank you so much for the support.rdquo; /p

p Dimitrov will play a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/alexei-popyrin/p09z/overview'Alexei Popyrin/a or a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/frances-tiafoe/td51/overview'Frances Tiafoe/a for a place in the semi-finals at Flushing Meadows. /p

p [NEWSLETTER FORM] /p