Madrid (Spain) – The closing round of this Friday’s Masters 1000 in Madrid featured the debuts of two important seeds. More calmly, German Alexander Zverev, the fourth main favorite in the competition, needed no more than 1h26 to defeat Croatian Borna Coric, former number 12 in the world and current 34th place, with a score of 6/3 and 6/2 , and thus reach the third round.
Two-time champion of the tournament in 2018 and 2021, Sascha will meet Canadian Denis Shapovalov in the next phase, against whom he has a 5-3 advantage in the direct confrontation. The two even faced each other in the semi-final six years ago, when the German prevailed in straight sets, heading towards his first title on clay in Madrid.
Absolute in service games, Zverev did not concede a single break-point to Coric in this Friday’s match, winning 81% of the points with the first serve, in addition to recording five aces and just one double fault. Without offering his opponent any chances, the German took advantage of four of the 11 break opportunities he had throughout the game to build the necessary advantage and emerge with the victory.
Rune suffers, but beats Argentine in almost 3 hours
Unlike Zverev, the Danish Holger Rune, 11th pre-registered, had a lot of difficulties against the Argentine Mariano Navone. The Rio Open and Bucharest finalist this season came out ahead and served for the game in the second set, remaining two points behind the classification, but ended up allowing Rune to come back, who won with partials of 5/7, 7 /6 (7-2) and 6/4 in 2h58 of battle, after seeing his rival save five match-points, four of them in the last game.
In his second participation in the tournament, the 20-year-old already equals last year’s campaign, when he stopped in the third round. He will now have a confrontation with the Dutchman Tallon Griekspoor, seeded 24th, who also had to react against the Japanese Taro Daniel and won by 4/6, 6/3 and 6/4. Griekspoor stood out in his only previous clash against Rune, on clay in Hamburg in 2022.
Struff wins his fifth straight and faces Humbert
Champion of the ATP 250 in Munich last Sunday, German Jan-Lennard Struff continues to thrive on clay and debuted with victory in Madrid, where he was a finalist last season. The victim this time was the Spaniard Jaume Munar, who ended up eliminated by the score of 6/1 and 7/5.
Seeded 23rd, Struff will now have an interesting duel with Frenchman Ugo Humbert, 13th favorite in the competition and owner of two titles in 2024, on the hard courts of Marseille and Dubai. The 25-year-old left-hander was yet another to start his campaign with a good victory, beating Dutchman Botic van de Zandschulp with a double 6/3. Previously, Struff won the only match between them, on the synthetic surface in Sofia in 2022.
