Wimbledon 2015: Vasek Pospisil books quarter-final against Andy Murray - and proves he should never be written off

Canadian comes through five set thriller with Viktor Troicki

Vasek Pospisil (GETTY IMAGES)

After Robert Powell played the last of his three Wimbledon quarter-finals in 1912 Canada had to wait more than a century for its next representative in the last eight of the men’s singles here. Milos Raonic finally broke the drought last year and, would you believe it, Vasek Pospisil today followed suit 12 months later.

The world No 56 beat Serbia’s Viktor Troicki 4-6, 6-7, 6-4, 6-3, 6-3 to earn a quarter-final showdown on Wednesday with Andy Murray.

Pospisil, aged 25, has become the marathon man of this tournament. Three of his four matches here have gone to five sets - the other went to four sets - and Monday’s was his second in a row to go the distance following his win over Britain’s James Ward on Saturday. He has also been defending his men’s doubles title with Jack Sock and returned to Court 12 later to play Jamie Murray and John Peers in the third round.

Troicki, who has had an excellent grass-court season, appeared to be in control when he took the first two sets, but once Pospisil broke for the first time in the third set the momentum quickly shifted.

Pospisil, who is 6ft 4in tall, hit only 12 aces to Troicki’s 12, but served superbly throughout. The Canadian faced only one break point in the whole match and dropped just 12 out of 89 points when his first serve found the court. In the deciding set he dropped only four points on serve.

“He was serving unbelievable and I didn’t have many chances on his serve,” Troicki said afterwards. “He took his chances and played more aggressively than me.”

Pospisil, whose parents emigrated to Canada from the former Czechoslovakia, had never gone beyond the third round of a Grand Slam event until he beat Ward on Saturday. He had also been in indifferent form going into the tournament. In the five months between the Australian Open and Wimbledon he did not win back-to-back matches in any of the 11 tournaments he contested.

Injuries disrupted Pospisil’s progress last year after his breakthrough summer in 2013, when he reached the semi-finals of the Montreal Masters. He has yet to win a title and has reached only one tour final, in Washington last summer.

Murray has beaten Pospisil in all three of their matches - all of them on hard courts - without losing a set. They have met twice already this year, in Rotterdam and Indian Wells.