Alexander Zverev had a semi-final at the National Bank Open.
He defeated last year’s winner in the process.
The top seed rally of Canada’s men’s tennis championships beat Australia’s 18th place Alexei Popyrin, 6-7 (8), 6-4, 6-3 on Monday night at Sobeys Stadium.
Currently, the Germans will be third in the ATP Tour rankings and will compete on Wednesday for Russia’s No. 11 seed Karen Khachanov or the United States’ Alex Michelsen No. 26.
Khachanov and Michelsen played the quarter-finals on the University of York campus in northwest Toronto.
Tuesday’s NBO schedule featured a pair of Americans.
Second-seed Taylor Fritz will be with Russia’s No. 6 Andrey Rublev in the quarter, while No. 4 Ben Shelton is planning to meet No. 9 in Australia’s Alex de Minaur. Both semi-finals entered Wednesday before Wednesday’s championship game.
Popyrin got the first set of a knife in a tiebreak, when his gentle backhand shot plundered the top of the net at a long rally and dropped the winning point, which pleased his fans, including an inflatable yellow Kangaroo.
Meanwhile, Zverev’s response was to immediately send the ball completely out of Sobeys Stadium in frustration.
Looking for his 25th Championship win and his eighth ATP 1000 Masters win, his response was to rise 2-0 in the second set.
Popyrin grabbed his rest before holding the serve 4-4. ZVEREV beat childhood idol Roger Federer eight years ago to win the Canadian championship in Montreal eight years ago, leading 5-4 before breaking his opponents to compete again.
Removed in the quarter-finals of last year’s tournament, Zverev scored another 2-0 breakout in the third set.
The 28-year-old lost to world number one Jannik Sinner in this year’s Australian Open and won the Open at the French Open, a 4-0 match against Popyrin ever, including a third-round victory at the Paris Olympics.
Zverev, who won two tournament wins on clay this year, was the highest-ranking player on Toronto court, lacking the star power of Sinner, second-place Carlos Alcaraz, No. 5 Jack Draper and No. 6 Novak Djokovic, all skipped the $91.9 million Hardcourt Event.
The 25-year-old Popyrin ranked 26th in the world, defeated Rublev in Montreal about 12 months ago to win his third championship title, but won nine games in Canada on Monday.
