The number one in world tennis, the Italian Jannik Sinnerbecame the first quarterfinalist of Shanghai Masters 1000 after taking his particular revenge against the American Ben Shelton through 6-4 and 7-6(1). In this way, Sinner keeps its appointment in the quarterfinals, a round it has already reached in the fourteen tournaments it has played this season.
And the fact is that the confrontation against the 16th ranked player in the ATP ‘ranking’ has a certain morbidity, because in the last edition of this tournament it was definitely the American who beat Sinner, also in round of 16.
That victory, which took place with a result of 2-6, 6-3, 7-6 (5), was the only one for Shelton in four meetings between the two tennis players before today. The other three fell on the side of the Sinner; the last of them, in the round of 16 at Wimbledon.
A high-level rivalry was expected and that was the case from the first moments. Shelton had the audience out of their seats with his repertoire: he pushed Sinner to the back of the court to resolve with subtle drop shots, or he pulled him to the net and hit him with a lob.
But Italian is in the top position of the ‘rank’ for a reason and, with a strong and determined game, he knew how to counter the American until the ninth game, when he broke his serve and closed out the first set.
More of the same in the second set: equality, quality tennis and Shelton wasting a break point to finally force a tiebreaker in which his rival showed himself to be imperial. In the end, the match was settled in one hour and 28 minutes.
Now, Sinner awaits another very tough opponent in the penultimate round of the tournament, where he will face the winner of the duel between the Russians. Daniel Medvedevnumber 5 in the ATP ranking, and the Greek Stefanos Tsitsipaswhich is located in the 12th place in the world table.
The transalpine tennis player earlier defeated Japanese Taro Daniel (6-1, 6-4) and Argentine Tomás Etcheverry (6-7 (3), 6-4, 6-2), while Shelton defeated Canadian Denis Shapovalov (6-3, 7-5) and the Spaniard Roberto Carballés (6-3, 6-4).
Source: La Verdad
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