The American Sebastian Korda, 26th player in the world, qualified for his first semi-final of a Masters 1000 by difficultly beating his compatriot Ben Shelton (N.20) 6-7 (10/12), 6-2, 7-6 (8/6) at the Shanghai tournament, Thursday. The No.26 seed concluded this thrilling quarter-final on his sixth match point and will face the Pole Hubert Hurkacz (17th in the world), seeded No.16, for a place in the final on Sunday.
Hurkacz had earlier beaten the Hungarian Fabian Marozsan (N.91) 4-6, 6-1, 6-3. Korda, aged 23, is heading towards a second ATP title.
This Shanghai tournament saw the successive falls of the top seed Carlos Alcaraz, eliminated in the round of 16, Daniil Medvedev – beaten by Korda – Holger Rune, Stefanos Tsitsipas and Jannik Sinner.
Korda, however, let slip five match points in the decisive tie-break. “We both reached a very high level of play and were delighted to get through a particularly tricky tiebreak,” said Korda, whose father, Petr, won the 1998 Australian Open.