Australian Open: Ben Shelton breaks Lorenzo Sonego’s dream and goes to semifinals
Lorenzo Sonego-Ben Shelton 4-6 5-7 6-4 6-7
Lorenzo Sonego's extraordinary journey at the Australian Open was interrupted in the quarterfinals. The Italian, in fact, è surrendered in four sets to Ben Shelton, number 21 in the ATP ranking and 20 in the seeding, who è imposed himself with the final score of 6-4 7-5 4-6 7-6 after almost four hours of play.
In the first set Sonego failed to take advantage of three break points in the sixth game and in the ninth he was punished: the Turin native saved two break points but on the third Shelton snatched the serve (5-4) and closed out the first partial on serve (6-4) with a terrifying 232-mph ace.
In the second set, the American break already came in the seventh game (4-3), confirmed in the eighth (5-3). Sonego, however, reacted and managed to tie at 5-5 but a new stretch by Shelton è lethal for the Italian (7-5) who found himself down two sets.
Sonego però did not give up and in the third set stayed in Shelton’s wake with his serve until 5-4: in the 10th game the U.S. went ahead 40-0 but was recovered by the Italian who at the second set point made the third set his, halving the disadvantage in the set count.
In the fourth set è the serve is the master. It thus comes to the tie-break, in which forò è Shelton to make the difference with serve and forehand: the American wins it by 7 points to 4 and flies to the semifinals where he awaits the winner of the challenge between Jannik Sinner and Alex De Minaur.
