Arthur Fery said he won’t change a thing before the biggest match of his career on Wednesday, sticking strictly to the winning formula that has fuelled his fairytale Wimbledon run to the quarter-finals.“I’m just going to stick to what I’ve been doing, just keep believing in myself, not letting go of matches, and we’ll see where that takes me,” Fery said. “I’m not going to change anything now. It’s working, I feel good.”Two days after the greatest win of his career, a brilliant fighting performance to defeat the former world No 3 Grigor Dimitrov on Centre Court in a fifth-set tie-break, Fery will return to centre stage to face the ninth seed Flavio Cobolli, one of the most in-form players on the tour. Fery has ample reason to believe he can defeat Cobolli, precisely because he has already done so this year.After coming through the qualifying draw at the Australian Open in January, Fery beat Cobolli, then ranked No 22, in straight sets to clinch what remains the joint-best win of his career by ranking. That victory, he said, will provide him with confidence for their rematch.“Definitely,” he said. “It’s going to be a good match regardless. I’m expecting it to be very, very difficult and different to Australia. Completely different conditions. I’m sure he’s going to be at 100% of his capacities here, which maybe he wasn’t quite 100% in Australia. I played really well in Australia. Felt like I dominated the match. So we’ll use that experience for Wednesday.”Arthur Fery reaches for a shot against Grigor Dimitrov. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The GuardianFrom Cobolli’s perspective, that meeting has no relevance at all to this occasion considering he was sick in Australia and far from at full strength. Either way, the Italian’s level is drastically different compared to the start of the year. Since that defeat, Cobolli has compiled a 10-1 win-loss record in grand slam tournaments, rolling to his first grand slam final at the French Open last month, where he lost in five tight sets against Alexander Zverev. As evidenced by his straight-sets win here against the fifth seed, Alex de Minaur, the 24-year-old is playing the best tennis of his career to date.This sport has demanded a significant amount of patience from Fery in order for him to succeed. His journey took him through the college tennis system in Stanford and his progress has been affected by a bone bruise injury to his arm, the same injury that has plagued Jack Draper, who withdrew from Wimbledon on the eve of the tournament, for a year. Even after his win against Cobolli in Australia, things were not quite right with Fery’s arm and he did not play for nearly two months until March.The injury has taken up so much of Fery’s time since he began his partnership with the Dutch coach Jeroen Benard last April. “It’s only been a year together, but it has been a long journey, regarding the injuries,” Benard said. “The injury was not just then, it was an injury that reoccurred on a monthly basis. Every time we started, he got hurt. We tried everything to get him healthy.”Despite the disruption, Benard always believed Fery was capable of a result like this. “In potential, definitely. Yes. I have told my parents this, what was it, five days ago? I said I knew that the potential was there. That it comes out, that quick – that’s tough to answer. For me as well. You hope, always – you don’t expect – but you see that there are definitely a lot of skills and tools that this could happen. That it happens here is great.”Fery has shown during his time at Wimbledon that through his defensive skills, sweet timing, intelligence and excellence at the net, he has plenty in his game to challenge top players such as Cobolli. “He’s just a smart player,” Jamie Murray said. “He reads the game very well, better than most. He’s quick to see when someone’s off balance or maybe going to have to take a hand off the racket. You can see he’s straight into the net and he’s very accomplished at little drop volleys or really whatever volley he wants to play.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionFlavio Cobolli is enjoying a breakout year. Photograph: Frey/TPN/Getty ImagesFery’s mental toughness, however, has been his defining quality throughout this run as he found a path to victory through consecutive fifth-set tie-breaks against Zizou Bergs and Dimitrov after trailing in both matches. “Oh, he loves the pressure,” Benard said. “That’s something for sure. That’s something that I see with him.“In Australia, I was more nervous to go on that big court than he was. In some sense, he really likes the magnitude of a match, a big stadium. It’s something that probably, I don’t know, he’s born with. I would, I cannot swear, but I would … my pants. All credit to him.”Greg Rusedski also views Fery’s toughness as one of his biggest weapons. The former British No 1 said: “I like his swagger, his fortitude, the way he never gives up. [Against] Bergs he was done and dusted, double break, found a way to turn it around; again in the fifth, down a break and finds a way to win. Dimitrov, two to one down, down a break in the fourth; amazing resilience, amazing belief, just don’t think about it. Why shouldn’t he be in the semis? What a run. What a moment.”