Defending champion, Stan Wawrinka, and last years finalist, Roger Federer, were both upset in their fourth round matches at the ATP Masters 1000 event in Monte Carlo. Roger Federer fell to the entertaining, Frenchman Gael Monfils, 6-4, 7-6(5). After making quick work of Monfils' countryman, Jeremy Chardy in the previous round, some saw this upset as a surprise, but the Swiss number one and world number two has only made it past the quarterfinals once in his last four appearances at the principality. Wawrinka's upset was much more of a surprise as Grigor Dimitrov has not been playing well for most of this year, but the Bulgarian has seemed to find his footing on the European dirt.
Federer got off to a quick start breaking Monfils in the fourth game, but an uncharacteristic double fault gave Monfils the break back. At 4-all, Monfils made his move. He made Federer move all over, making the Swiss very uncomfortable on his worst surface and capitalized to get the break opportunity. He served it out with ease as a backhand error by Federer gave Monfils the lead. Hold of serve was the story of the second set as both men were dominant in that aspect. In the second set tiebreaker, Federer looked to jump on the chance to go up 6-3 after a mini-break at 4-3, but errors from the world number two got the Frenchman back in it. Another backhand error from Roger Federer on match point gave the match to Monfils, getting the crowd in the principality riled up as a strong French contingincy was there. Federer hit 38 unforced errrors compared more than half of Monfils' total of 17.
Grigor Dimitrov made quick work of the reigning champion, Stan Wawrinka, dispatching him, 6-1, 6-2. The Bulgarian got off to the quick start as he'd like breaking Stan the Man in his first two service games. One more break on Wawrinka's service game gave Dimitrov the first set. Grigor continued his agressivness in the second set attacking the net often when Wawrinka hit short balls, or when he knew it was right time to go put pressure on Wawrinka. Although Stan got off to a much better start in the second set, Dimitrov continued to attack, attack, and attack. His persistent attacking forced Stan to go for more, but he would often miss. With the win, Dimitrov has set up a showdown with Gael Monfils in the quarterfinals.