A year ago, Rafael Jodar was ranked No. 540. Now, he’s No. 11 and playing for a spot in the Montreal final.
By Richard Pagliaro | Tuesday, August 11, 2026
Photo credit: National Bank Open Facebook
A stretched Rafael Jodar smacked a slingshot return dive-bombing into Arthur Fils’ shoelaces.
Even when Fils displaced the Spaniard, Jodar frequently fired back destructive replies.
The 19-year-old Jodar dispatched Fils 7-6(5), 6-3—the same score he stamped over the Frenchman in Washington, DC—to advance to his fourth Tour-level semifinal in Montreal.
A year ago, Jodar was ranked No. 540 playing Challengers in Poland and Greece and dreaming of the big stages.
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Now, Jodar is rocking elite opponents on some of the sport’s prestigious stages as he’s rocked up to No. 11 in the ATP Live Rankings.
The 20th-seeded Jodar will face his Washington, DC doubles partner—American Brandon Nakashima—for a spot in the Montreal final.
Earlier, the 28th-seeded Nakashima led start to finish sweeping Luciano Darderi 6-2, 6-3 to charge into his maiden ATP Masters 1000 semifinal in Montreal today.
It’s the second straight semifinal for the Spanish teenager, who was runner-up to American Taylor Fritz in the Washington, DC final earlier this month. Jodar avenged a 6-3, 2-6, 3-6 loss to Fils in the Barcelona semifinals last April. Jodar is the 11th teenager in Open Era history to reach the Canadian Open semifinals—and is the first man born in 2006 or later to reach a semifinal at ATP Masters 1000 level.
Timing the ball well from the start, the lanky Jodar unleashed some heavy hitting breaking in Fils’ first service game for 2-0.
Cracking crosscourt forehands, Jodar charged to a 4-1 lead after 19 minutes of play.
As the set progressed, a sweat-soaked Fils was finding the angle with his forehand. Fils hit that stroke with more spin than Jodar and began mixing some shorter, sharper angles with crosscourt cannon fire.
The Frenchman rattled out three forehand errors in a row, including a wild miss down the line that left Fils screaming “come on” as he broke back for 3-4.
Fils was serving at 4-5, 30-love when a slight shower escalated into steady rain suspending play at 3:06 p.m. Eastern time.
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About an hour after the suspension, play resumed with Fils holding to level after 10 games.
Down Love-30 in the 12th game, Fils fired a flurry of forehands running off four points in a row to force the tiebreaker.
Jodar began the 2026 season ranked No. 168 and one reason for his rocket rise up the rankings is his skill playing dynamic and disciplined tennis at critical stages.
Rapping a running backhand strike down the line to open the court, Jodar carved a fine forehand drop shot for the mini break and a 2-1 lead. Jodar won a couple of forehand exchanges, extending to 4-1.
Whipping the wide serve brought the Spanish teenager three set points. Fils saved the first two on his serve. On his third set point, Jodar drove the ball deep forcing the forehand error to close a quality opening set in 63 minutes.
Unrelenting deep drives from across the net caused the Frenchman to crack. Fils dragged a backhand into net to face a break point.
Slamming a drive down the line, Jodar followed it forward and slid into a slick angled backhand volley breaking in style for 2-1 after one hour, 14 minutes.
That break caused Fils to erupt spiking his Babolat stick to the hard court twice in rapid succession to snap its head and incur a code violation warning from chair umpire Fergus Murphy.
The edge came off Fils’ form and Jodar stepped up with some timely strikes in the seventh game.
A sloppy Fils double faulted then saw Jodar jolt a head-snapping backhand return down the line to side up a soft forehand dropper for triple break point. Pushed into pursuit, Fils went all in on a backhand down the line but missed it wide as Jodar broke at love for 4-3.
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By then the 22-year-old Fils was dripping sweat fighting to extend the match in the ninth game.
Jodar wasn’t having it. Though Fils fought off three match points, Jodar ripped a forehand down the line for a fourth match point.
Running the Frenchman wide with a sharp-angled backhand, Jodar flicked a forehand crosscourt to close in one hour, 42 minutes.
Jodar, the youngest man in the field, will face Nakashima, at 25 the oldest man still standing, for the first time with a maiden trip to an ATP Masters 1000 final on the line.
Richard Pagliaro. Richard Pagliaro is Tennis Now Managing Editor. He is a graduate of New York University and has covered pro tennis for more than 35 years. Richard was tennis columnist for Gannett Newspapers in NY, served as Managing Editor for TennisWeek.com and worked as a writer/editor for Tennis.com. He has been TennisNow.com managing editor since 2010.