After battling to an epic victory against Arnaud Clement, Rainer Schuettler reflected it could easily have been the Frenchman going on to face Rafael Nadal in the semi-final.
The match, which resumed on Court One on Thursday after being prematurely ended the previous evening by bad light, came close to being the longest ever singles match at Wimbledon - at five hours and 12 minutes, it was 17 minutes short of claiming that record.
As it was, the joint second-longest match held enough twists and turns to live long in the memory.
Clement was a break up in the third and saved six successive set points after falling 6-0 down in the tie-breaker, before Schuettler let a 4-1 lead slip in the fourth.
And Schuettler admitted it had been an unusual encounter.
"Honestly, it was really a strange match," he said.
"I mean, he was 4-1 up. I was in the fourth 4-1 up, had two or three break points for 5-1, so the entire match was really, really strange."
"And after winning six points, I was like, okay, two sets to one, solid. Now he has to really try to win it and try to be more aggressive, try to risk it."
"Then 6-6, I was like, oh my God, what's happening here? If you make the third set then obviously it's a big advantage - also mentally."
"I thought in the fourth set I had it, and then it changed the other way. So you never know."
"Even in the fifth set, I mean, I was serving for the match. He had match point. So it was back and forth."
"Well, that's tennis. I'm sorry for him. I'm very happy that I made it."
Schuettler now has the unenviable task of facing the world No.2 and second seed less than 24 hours after bringing his marathon encounter to a close.
Nadal himself will go into the game off an extra day's rest, having seen off Andy Murray in his quarter-final on Wednesday evening, but the German was reluctant to concede it would be a key factor.
"He has an advantage anyway. He's pretty fit anyway," said the 32-year-old.
"But I don't really care. I also work hard. I'm physically fit. So I will get a massage later on and I'll try to go, if possible, to sleep early, so that I have enough hours of sleep, and I will be fine."
"We played I think three hours today, and yesterday two. But when you play normal tournaments, you play on hard courts or clay courts, it's normal. You play two hours one day, and next day three hours, three and a half."
"It's okay. Obviously he has an advantage, but I will be okay. I'm not so tired."
Clement is no stranger to marathon matches, having lost to Fabrice Santoro in the 2004 French Open in six hours and 33 minutes - the longest match in the history of men's professional tennis.
Records of endurance are of little consequence to him, though.
"It was the longest match against Santoro in Paris. I lost it, more than six hours. When you lost a match like this, you don't really care about (it being) the longest match ever," he said.
"It's not an interesting record. The record of Federer is a little bit more interesting."
Clement was clearly shattered by the defeat, but could appreciate the quality of the match.
"It was a