World No. 3 Dominic Thiem has been knocked out of French Open by 12th seeded Diego Schwartzman in the quarter-finals. Schwartzman beat Thiem 6-7, 7-5, 7-6, 6-7, 2-6, reported AFP.

28-year-old Schwartzman will face either 12-time champion Rafael Nadal or Italian teenager Jannik Sinner for a place in the final. Schwartzman had defeated Nadal in the Rome quarter-finals on the eve of the French Open. His success came on the same day that compatriot and world 131, Nadia Podoroska reached the last-four of the women’s singles. 

Schwartzman told AFP, “Dominic is one of the great players. He is my best friend and I have a lot of respect for him. So this win is very important for me. In the second and third sets, I was going a little crazy and I was screaming at myself because I had so many chances. But, come on, I deserved to win tonight.

Despite crunching 65 winners to his opponent’s 47, Thiem committed 81 unforced errors in a match which featured 19 breaks of serve and at five hours and eight minutes was the second longest of the tournament. Schwartzman recovered from a break down in the 65-minute first set to sweep through the tiebreaker.

Nadal is in the quarter-finals for the 14th time and can equal Roger Federer’s record of 20 Grand Slam titles with victory in the final. But standing in front of him is  Sinner, the Italian 19-year-old who is the first player to reach the last eight on his Roland Garros debut since Nadal lifted the trophy in 2005.