World No. 6 Alexander Zverev on Tuesday described his 7-6 (9/7), 6-4 loss to Taylor Fritz as “flat” as he was knocked out of the Swiss Indoors.
The German’s loss to the 21-year-old American came barely a week after a defeat in the Shanghai Masters final to Daniil Medvedev and puts his chance of defending his ATP Finals title at risk.
“I was completely flat for some reason,” Zverev said. “I was tired and not focused at all. It was a weird feeling.”
The season points race is to be determined next week at the Paris Masters as the last two of the eight spots are decided.
Zverev, a semi-finalist last year in Basel, fought hard to take the opening set into a tiebreaker, but was overwhelmed in the second by his American opponent in 86 minutes.
“Normally I really enjoy it on court, the tough moments, the fighting,” Zverev said. “But today I was completely out of it. I may go home for a few days and clear my mind. I’ll try to do well in Paris and hopefully make it to London.”
Fritz, ranked 31st in the world and a winner at Eastbourne in June, saved both break points against his serve.
London-bound third seed Stefanos Tsitsipas came through with a 6-3, 7-6 (8/6) win over Spaniard Albert Ramos-Vinolas.
The Greek now boasts wins in eight of his past 10 matches, including a final in Beijing over Dominic Thiem.
Fabio Fognini picked up his London qualifying pace with a 6-2, 6-4 victory over Australian Alexei Popyrin. The Italian winner reached the second round in 78 minutes to reinforce his year-end bid.
Moldovan Radu Albot was yesterday to line up in the second round against nine-time champion Roger Federer after a 2-6, 6-3, 6-4 comeback win over Serb Dusan Lajovic.
The US’ Riley Opelka hammered 27 aces in his 7-6 (7/5), 7-6 (12/10) defeat of Chile’s Christian Garin and is to face either sixth seed David Goffin or Marin Cilic.
Two-time Basel semi-finalist Richard Gasquet advanced past Argentine Juan Ignacio Londero 6-1, 7-6 (7/4).
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
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