The Olympic champion won a hard fight, 5-7 6-3 7-6 (7/5), ahead of Jannik Sinner (ATP 12) on Friday in the quarter-finals.
Alexander Zverev had to fight for 3h07′ to take the measure of the Italian, who had won their only previous duel on clay (in 2020 at Roland-Garros). The German missed an early closing chance as he served for the match at 5-4 in the third set, but proved to be more solid than his opponent in an extremely tense tiebreak.
Author of a lackluster start to the season marked by his elimination in the round of 16 of the Australian Open and his freakout in doubles in Acapulco, Alexander Zverev is aiming for his sixth title in a Masters 1000. He will find in semi-final the holder of the trophy, the Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas (ATP 5), winner 6-2 6-7 (3/7) 6-4 of Diego Schwartzman (ATP 16) in the last quarter.
Stefanos Tsitsipas came back from very far in this part with an improbable scenario which ended shortly before 11 p.m. He indeed had to dismiss a 0-5 ball in the third set, when he himself seemed to have won the match at 6-2 5-2 in his favor. The 2021 Roland-Garros finalist has pulled himself together to pocket the last six games.
Davidovich Fokina confirms
The other semi-final will pit Grigor Dimitrov (ATP 29) against Novak Djokovic’s scorer, Alejandro Davidovich Fokina (ATP 46). The Bulgarian won 6-4 3-6 7-6 (7/2) ahead of the Pole Hubert Hurkacz (ATP 14) in the quarter-finals to find the last Monegasque square which he had already reached in 2018.
Quarter-finalist last year in the Principality – as well as at Roland-Garros a few weeks later, Alejandro Davidovich Fokina for his part dismissed the American Taylor Fritz (ATP 13) on Friday. Winner 2-6 6-4 6-3, the Spaniard will thus play his first semi-final in a tournament stamped Masters 1000.