p In one of the biggest matches of his young career and with his family in town, a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/arthur-fils/f0f1/overview'Arthur Fils/a rose to the occasion on Saturday at the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/hamburg/414/overview'Hamburg Open/a. /p
p The #NextGenATP Frenchman delivered a stunning display of baseline hitting in stiflingly hot conditions to down third seed a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/sebastian-baez/b0bi/overview'Sebastian Baez/a 6-2, 6-2. With his 67-minute win on the German clay, the 20-year-old Fils advanced to his first ATP 500 championship match. /p
p ldquo;I played once or twice better than that, but of course it was great tennis on my part today,rdquo; said Fils in his post-match interview. ldquo;It was very hot, so it was very fast and my serve was working pretty well. That helped me a lot today and I donrsquo;t know if tomorrow it will be that hot, but I hope so.rdquo; /p
p Fils converted four of seven break points he earned, according to Infosys ATP Stats, en route to a dominant victory in his maiden Lexus ATP Head2Head clash with Baez. The current leader in the PIF ATP Live Race To Jeddah, Fils was competing in the Hamburg semi-finals for the second straight year and will next face the man he lost to in 2023, a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/alexander-zverev/z355/overview'Alexander Zverev/a, in Sundayrsquo;s final./p
blockquote class="twitter-tweet"
p lang="en" dir="ltr"Fils like a great day to be Arthur ????????????a href="https://twitter.com/ArthurFils1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@ArthurFils1/a leaps into the finals after defeating Baez 6-2 6-2 a href="https://twitter.com/hamburgopenatp?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@hamburgopenatp/a | a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/HamburgOpenATP500?src=hashamp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"#HamburgOpenATP500/a a href="https://t.co/2mxH4Az3kO"pic.twitter.com/2mxH4Az3kO/a/p
mdash; ATP Tour (@atptour) a href="https://twitter.com/atptour/status/1814679187594064138?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"July 20, 2024/a/blockquote
script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"/script
pIn Sunday's final, Fils can rely on strong support from his mum and brother, who flew from France to support him for the match against Baez. /p
p ldquo;My brother has been texting me since the start of the week saying, lsquo;I want to come, I want to come,'rdquo; explained Fils. ldquo;I said, lsquo;OK, if I make the semis, you can come, because it is Saturday, and you donrsquo;t have anything to do.' /p
p ldquo;They took the flight this morning and arrived at 12, and they are leaving tomorrow after the final. So now itrsquo;s pretty nice to see my brother and my mum here in the stands. Of course I am missing my sister, but she is on vacation and having a good time.rdquo; /p
p Fils has risen five spots to No. 23 in the PIF ATP Live Rankings as a result of his run in Hamburg so far. Should he win his second ATP Tour crown on Sunday, he will rise to a career-high No. 20 in Mondayrsquo;s edition of the PIF ATP Rankings./p
[ATP APP]
pZverev, the top seed and defending champion, continued his run on home soil with a 6-2, 6-4 win against a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/pedro-martinez/mo44/overview'Pedro Martinez/a later on Saturday. The 27-year-old is through to his third consecutive clay final after Rome (d. Jarry) and a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/roland-garros/520/overview'Roland Garros/a (l. to Alcaraz). It is his 35th tour-level final overall (22-12), and his eighth in Germany./p
pZverev leads the ATP Tour with 44 wins this year, two ahead of a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/jannik-sinner/s0ag/overview'Jannik Sinner/a. Only Zverev, Sinner and a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/casper-ruud/rh16/overview'Casper Ruud/a (40) have at least 40 tour-level singles wins so far in 2024./p
pimg src="/-/media/images/news/2024/07/20/17/20/zverev-hamburg-2024-saturday.jpg" style="width:100%;" alt="a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/alexander-zverev/z355/overview'Alexander Zverev/a" /br /
emPhoto by a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/hamburg/414/overview'Hamburg Open/a ATP 500/Mathias Schulz/em/p
pWith the help of 11 aces, Zverev did not lose a service game against Martinez, saving the only break point he faced. It was the third match this week in which the German did not surrender his serve, after he did not face a break point against a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/jesper-de-jong/d0c1/overview'Jesper de Jong/a or Zhang Zhizhen./p
pHe will next bid to improve to 3-0 in his Lexus ATP Head2Head against Fils, who he beat in three sets last month in Halle./p
p"He's somebody that is extremely aggressive and he's somebody that is very young," Zverev said of his final opponent. "He obviously has the talent, he has the potential to be one of the best players in the world, and it's up to him to realise his potential. Tomorrow I'm going to do everything that I can to prevent that, for him to make a step forward. But he's a great talent and there's nothing bad to say about him."/p
pJust the second German champion in Hamburg after a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/michael-stich/s351/overview'Michael Stich/a (1993), Zverev is bidding to become the first home favourite to successfully defend the crown. /p
p [NEWSLETTER FORM] /p
