It was a surprising quarterfinal Friday at the Rolex Shanghai Masters, where both Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer exited the penultimate Masters 1000 event of the season. Djokovic was upset by Stefanos Tsitsipas 3-6, 7-5, 6-3, while Federer fell to Alexander Zverev 6-3, 6-7(7), 6-3.
Tsitsipas struck 11 aces, won 83 percent of his first-serve points, and held 14 of his 15 service games.
“It’s the best comeback that I have ever had, probably,” the 21-year-old Greek commented. “It was a very difficult victory mentally, too. I wasn’t really thinking that long term that I have to win two sets. It just went step by step. It happened. I broke him, I won the set, I stayed there, broke him again, eventually I got the win at the end. I wasn’t really thinking too much in the future, and I think that helped a lot.”
“He had the high-quality tennis and he played very well after his serve,” Djokovic said of Tsitsipas. “He was backing up his serve with really good and aggressive first shots in the rally. I didn’t make him defend enough. I just gave him enough time to really dictate the play from back of the court and he deserved to win.”
Next up for the world No. 7 is familiar foe Daniil Medvedev, who is sweeping the head-to-head series 4-0. A red-hot Medvedev is one win away from reaching a sixth straight final after beating Fabio Fognini 6-3, 7-6(4) in the quarters.
Zverev squandered five set points in the middle frame of play against Federer but recovered to triumph after two hours and four minutes. The sixth-ranked German has apparently revamped his serve on this Asian swing and he fired 17 aces while double-faulting only once on Friday.
“(I’m) finally starting to kind of play the way I should play, really,” Zverev assessed. “I was playing really defensive the whole year, and I was not with a lot of confidence.”
The 22-year-old will now meet Matteo Berrettini, who defeated Dominic Thiem 7-6(8), 6-4. Both Zverev and Berrettini are in position for the last two Nitto ATP Finals spots, but the winner of Saturday’s showdown will be close to a lock whereas the loser will still have plenty of work to do.
Tsitsipas on Friday became the sixth man to clinch a 2019 London spot.
[polldaddy poll=10430556]
[polldaddy poll=10430645]
Leave a Reply