De Minaur and Tsitsipas Stay Unbeaten at Next Gen Finals - UBITENNIS

De Minaur and Tsitsipas Stay Unbeaten at Next Gen Finals

By John Horn
4 Min Read
Courtesy: ATP/TennisTV

Milan, Italy

Alex de Minaur and Stefanos Tsitispas proved once they again they are the class of the Next Gen players on the ATP Tour, at least for this week they are.

The top ranked 21 and under players in the tournament stayed unbeaten in the round-robin portion of the Next Gen ATP Finals winning their final matches on Thursday night in Milan.

De Minaur won a first set tiebreak and then dominated the final two sets defeating Taylor Fritz 4-3, 4-1, 4-2 in 70 minutes while Tsitispas won his final match eight minutes faster in straight sets over Hubert Hurkacz.

The 19-year old de Minaur was playing so well, at one point in the third set after an outstanding forehand winner on the run down the line, Fritz initially dropped his racquet in frustration but quickly realized how good the Australian’s shot was and began clapping his approval instead.

Tsitsipas and De Minaur, the two youngest players in the eight-man field, have dropped just one set each over their three matches and both are the only players still in the running for the undefeated champions prize of $407,000. Last years winner Hyeon Chung accomplished that feat in the tournament a year ago.

De Minaur won 11 of 14 points at the net and faced just two break points in his match. He also saved an impressive 6 set points in the opening set tiebreak. Tsitispas was not quite as sharp with his serve but he did manage to save all five of the break points he faced.

Like de Minaur, the 20-year old Greek had a jaw dropping shot in the third set of his match as well. A beautiful crosscourt backhand snuck past Hurkacz at the net bringing the crowd out of their seats.

Friday’s Semi-Finals will see de Minaur take on Spaniard Jaume Munar at seven o’clock local time. Munar surprised Frances Tiafoe earlier in the day in straight sets to book himself a Semi-Final berth. The late match will see Tsitsipas face Andrey Rublev who defeated Italian Wild Card Liam Caruana also in straights. Both Semi-Final match ups will be the first career meetings between the players.

“I just want to go out there and keep doing what I’ve been doing,” said de Minaur.” I’ve been serving well. I’ve been playing confident and,  just leaving it all out there again.”

“We are both playing great tennis,” said Tsitspas, the No.1 ranked player in the tournament. “We’re both fighting on the court. Both of us are very professional and take every match seriously. And Alex has done a great year. I think two ATP finals…which is impressive for his age. His game is much different than most of the Next Gen players, which is inspiring to see.”

@Sportshorn

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