Raonic stuns former champion Warwrinka in Melbourne

Milos Raonic celebrates his win over Swiss Stan Wawrinka, setting up a quarter-final showdown with Gael Monfils. (Photo: AFP/William West)

MELBOURNE: Canada's Milos Raonic fought off a comeback by 2014 champion Stan Wawrinka in a tense five-setter before taking a major scalp and reaching his second straight Australian Open quarter-final on Monday.

Raonic, who earlier spoke of his grief over a high school shooting in his home country, eliminated the Swiss world number four 6-4, 6-3, 5-7, 4-6, 6-3 and will face Gael Monfils in the quarters.

The 13th seed, who beat Wawrinka's fellow Swiss Roger Federer to win this month's Brisbane International, remains unbeaten this year after his impressive victory in three hours 44 minutes.

It was Raonic's first win against the reigning French Open champion in five meetings, and he has not lost a match at tour level since going down to Rafael Nadal in the third round of last year's Shanghai Masters.

Raonic, looking to take his game to another level under new coach Carlos Moya, was on track for a straight-sets win after four service breaks to lead by two sets in 76 minutes.

But Wawrinka lifted his intensity and took the match to a fifth set.

"It is more about what always comes down to me, trying to play in my rhythm, dictate and control the centre of the court and I thought like I was able to carry that through today," Raonic said.

"It's the next step for me to try and achieve the goals I want to achieve and I am always looking at ways to get better and I am always working for that."

The match turned in the third set when Wawrinka broke Raonic's serve in the 11th game and served out to keep the encounter alive.

Raonic started missing more and Wawrinka picked up his serving percentage, and he broke the Canadian in the fifth game of the fourth set and fought off four break points on his serve in the eighth game.

Wawrinka steamed to triple set point in the 10th game and took the match into a fifth set with the momentum shifting his way.

But in the final set, Wawrinka lost serve in a shaky sixth game when on second break point his forehand drive was just out, giving Raonic a 4-2 lead.

Wawrinka saved a match point in the eighth game but Raonic brought up a further three match points and finally won it with a put-away at the net.

Raonic, who dedicated his third-round win over Viktor Troicki to victims of last week's school shooting which left four dead, has yet to beat shotmaker Monfils in their two meetings so far.

'SUPERMAN'

Monfils was hailed as 'Superman' after another customary acrobatic dive filled photographers' lenses and set social media alight.

Monfils, however, was more satisfied with the fact that he had gone on to beat Andrey Kuznetsov 7-5 3-6 6-3 7-6(4) to advance to his first quarter-final at Melbourne Park.

And while he had no regrets with the spectacular dive, he admitted that it did hurt.

"It's very painful," he told reporters. "I cannot even grip anything right now. I have a deep cut. That's nothing. But I have a bruise. I'm lucky to not have a fracture.

"I am not a rock."

Monfils was indeed lucky.

(Photo: AFP/Peter Parks)

Having been wrong footed by Kuznetsov at 2-2 in the second set with the Russian serving at 40-40 he changed direction and flung himself full length at the ball in an attempt to make a return. He failed.

The decision to dive, despite the potential risk of injury, however, was not calculated, he said as every time he flamboyantly slid or dived on court, he was acting purely on instinct.

"During the point, I feel that I can have it," he said. "I just go for it. I'm just a competitor, I want to win every point and I think I can get it and I just fly.

"People need to understand that if I dive, it's because I know I can dive. There is no practice. It's instinct."

Kuznetsov held serve to take a 3-2 lead in the second set before Monfils called a medical time out to have the bleeding stopped. The pain caused him some issues in the set, which he feared could have changed the momentum of the game.

"He had a good second set," Monfils said. "I lost a bit of the momentum because at this period I thought I had him. It was a bit tough for me to grip my racquet.

"Then it was a bit tougher to play."