Khachanov Saves Five Match Points to Beat Machac and Reach Almaty Quarterfinals

TL;DR: Karen Khachanov was five points from going home and won anyway. The No. 5 seed saved four match points at 5-6 in the third set against Tomas Machac and a fifth in the tiebreak, closed out 6-2, 4-6, 7-6(7), and reached the Almaty quarter-finals on Thursday. It is his 27th win of the season, it sets up a Friday quarter-final against home favourite Alexander Bublik, and it is the first match of his new coaching arrangement after he split with Vedran Martic earlier in the week, a story this site covered in full when Khachanov ended the ten-year partnership.

Five match points, five different answers. Tennis Now’s shot-by-shot account is the best kind of escape story because every point had its own character. On the first, at 5-6 in the third, Machac missed a backhand at the end of a long rally and could only rue the opening. On the second and third, Khachanov hit booming first serves out wide that were too hot to handle. On the fourth, Machac was cursing himself again after missing a midcourt forehand wide of the sideline. The fifth came with Machac serving at 6-7 in the tiebreak, and Khachanov produced the point of the tournament, running the length of the court several times before drawing the forehand error that ended it. Two points later the match was his.

What did Khachanov say afterward?

That words had failed him, which is usually when the words are doing the honest thing. “I am speechless,” he said. “I was living through these hard moments but then the relief is there when you win these kinds of hard matches.” Tennis Majors carries the compressed version: “He pushed me to the limits. I stayed there; I survived.” Survived is the right verb for a week in which he is also surviving a coaching transition — the new voice in the box this week is Andrei Chesnokov, on trial through the end of the season, and Almaty is where the trial’s evidence starts getting collected.

Why does the Bublik quarter-final matter?

Because it is the draw’s loudest match now. Bublik reached the quarter-finals without hitting a ball, after Fabian Marozsan withdrew through illness, and the home crowd will be waiting in a way they were not for the walkover. The head-to-head is 1-1, and Bublik won the most recent meeting at Halle in 2025, per Sportskeeda’s preview, which also notes Khachanov is only 1-3 in quarter-finals this year. Bublik’s serve on indoor hard courts against Khachanov’s week of tiebreak survival is the kind of contrast the 2024 champion’s title defence is now made of.

Why could Machac not close it?

Because the last step is the loneliest one in the sport. Machac had Khachanov at 5-6 in the third and did the hardest part of closing wrong in the way closers always do: he missed. A backhand at the end of a long rally on the first match point, a midcourt forehand wide of the sideline on the fourth. Tennis Now’s description of the tiebreak fifth is the telling one — Khachanov ran the length of the court several times, made Machac hit one more ball, and drew the forehand error. Closing requires the server to take the point; Machac waited for Khachanov to give it, and the two points that followed were just the bill arriving. It is the same lesson the Goffin farewell week taught from the other side: the player who has to win the last two points usually has to earn them twice.

What does the rest of Almaty look like?

The draw’s two storylines stayed on a collision course. Defending champion Daniil Medvedev needed 52 minutes to beat Sho Shimabukuro 6-2, 6-1, then called Jannik Sinner and Carlos Alcaraz “in a good way, freaks,” per Tennis Majors, adding that staying healthy is part of the game and that this year it was not the case for them. Terence Atmane continued the apology week’s second act, beating Mattia Bellucci 6-7(4), 7-6(2), 7-6(5) to reach his third ATP Tour quarter-final, and now faces Medvedev on Friday. Elsewhere on the farewell circuit this week, David Goffin’s singles career ended in tears in Brussels, the same week Stefanos Tsitsipas’s coaching split freed his game — Almaty has become the place where the year’s stories get their second acts.

What does the escape mean for Khachanov’s season?

A second wind inside a season that has been full of them. This is his fifth quarter-final of the year and his 27th win, and it arrives at 30, with a new coach on a trial and a first-round exit avoided at the cost of five heart attacks. The Vienna and Paris weeks come next with Chesnokov travelling, and a preseason call on whether the trial becomes the job. Thursday’s answer to that audition was as loud as tennis gets: four match points down on serve, a fifth in the breaker, and still walking off the winner.