Jannik Sinner and Taylor Fritz raced by to the semi-finals because the opening day of the Six Kings Slam exhibition fell flat in Saudi Arabia. Sinner thrashed Stefanos Tsitsipas 6-2 6-3 to e book a semi-final with Novak Djokovic after Fritz required simply 59 minutes to beat Alexander Zverev and arrange a conflict with Carlos Alcaraz on Thursday.
Both Tsitsipas and Zverev will head dwelling from the six-player exhibition after only one match having obtained a reported $1.5m for turning up. The total champion will win an extra $4.5m, making the three-day occasion the largest prize fund of the tennis season. Zverev earned roughly $250,000 extra for his 59-minute defeat to Fritz than he did for ending runner-up on the Australian Open in January, and was paid round $25,000 per minute for his one match on the Six Kings Slam.
Zverev’s efficiency was notably disappointing, though the German gave the impression to be combating a proper shoulder harm all through the match. The World No 3 was underpowered and repeatedly rolled serves into the center of the service field that have been 20kmph slower than his season common. Fritz has now received seven consecutive matches towards Zverev – however this received’t depend on the official head-to-head information – and didn’t must get out of second gear to win 6-4 6-3 in entrance of a muted crowd in Riyadh.
Defending champion Sinner was making his first look since retiring from his third-round match in Shanghai and was relentless in opening up a 5-0 lead towards Tsitsipas within the different quarter-final, repeatedly concentrating on the Greek’s one-handed backhand with vicious blows from his forehand.
Tsitsipas has a 6-3 profitable file towards Sinner coming into the exhibition, however the match-up is now not one for the previous World No 3. Tsitsipas emerged with some credit score by conserving Sinner’s margin of victory to the lack of simply 5 video games, but it surely was one other one-sided victory that was over after 76 minutes.
“We performed already many occasions, after all,” Sinner stated. “By the time we grow to be higher gamers and we all know one another’s recreation just a little bit extra, so I knew just a little bit additionally tactically the way to put together for the match. I simply tried to remain fairly aggressive, particularly on the return video games. I felt like I used to be serving very properly within the necessary moments.”
Sinner will go for a seventh consecutive victory towards the 24-time grand slam champion Djokovic, for those who embody their assembly in final 12 months’s Six King semi-finals. Sinner has received each matches towards the 38-year-old this season, within the French Open and Wimbledon semi-finals.
“It’s an enormous honour to play once more, towards a legend like Novak,” Sinner stated. “It’s nice to have him nonetheless right here taking part in within the highest degree of our sport. He’s an awesome position mannequin. He’s nonetheless hungry to win massive titles and and that is why he nonetheless retains taking part in. Hopefully it may be fascinating tomorrow.”
Sinner, in the meantime, questioned the “uncommon” court docket floor in Riyadh, which was extraordinarily bouncy on kick-serves however was flat and gradual throughout some rallies. “It’s a really uncommon indoor court docket.,” Sinner stated. “It is a really fascinating state of affairs we’ve to take care of right here on the court docket as a result of it is fairly bouncy, with new balls it is fairly quick and it slows down with with used balls.”
