Zverev sinks Rune to reach Paris final
pa href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/alexander-zverev/z355/overview'Alexander Zverev/a reached his first hard-court final of the season on Saturday at the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/paris/352/overview'Rolex Paris Masters/a, where he overcame former champion a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/holger-rune/r0dg/overview'Holger Rune/a to end the Danersquo;s faint a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/nitto-atp-finals/605/overview'Nitto ATP Finals/a hopes./ppThe German recovered from failing to serve out the match at 5-4 in the second set, resisting a late fightback from Rune to eventually earn a 6-3, 7-6(4) victory after one hour and 47 minutes./ppWith his 65th win of the season, Zverev drew level with a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/jannik-sinner/s0ag/overview'Jannik Sinner/a for the most victories on Tour in 2024, while he has climbed one spot to No. 2 in the PIF ATP Live Rankings, passing a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/carlos-alcaraz/a0e2/overview'Carlos Alcaraz/a./pp"I feel like I made it a little difficult for myself but he is a champion. It is probably his favourite tournament and favourite court, but I am happy to be in my second final here," Zverev said. "I am looking forward to it."/pblockquote class="twitter-tweet"p lang="en" dir="ltr"No stopping the Zverev Express ????a href="https://twitter.com/AlexZverev?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@AlexZverev/a advances into his 12th ATP Masters 1000 FINAL!!! a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RolexParisMasters?src=hashamp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"#RolexParisMasters/a | a href="https://twitter.com/RolexPMasters?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@RolexPMasters/a a href="https://t.co/luYjPH9F3m"pic.twitter.com/luYjPH9F3m/a/pmdash; ATP Tour (@atptour) a href="https://twitter.com/atptour/status/1852726439247831153?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"November 2, 2024/a/blockquotescript async="" src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"/scriptpZverev is a former finalist in Paris, having lost in the title match in 2020 to a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/daniil-medvedev/mm58/overview'Daniil Medvedev/a. The 27-year-old is chasing his seventh ATP Masters 1000 crown and first hard-court trophy above ATP 250 level since he won the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/nitto-atp-finals/605/overview'Nitto ATP Finals/a in 2021./ppZverev, who will compete at the prestigious year-end event in Turin, to be held from 10-17 November, will meet French star a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/ugo-humbert/hh26/overview'Ugo Humbert/a or former champion a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/karen-khachanov/ke29/overview'Karen Khachanov/a in the Paris final on Sunday./ppstrongATP Tour Win Leaders 2024/strongbr /table tbody tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/jannik-sinner/s0ag/overview'Jannik Sinner/anbsp;/td td65-6 (W/L)/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/alexander-zverev/z355/overview'Alexander Zverev/a/td td65-20/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/carlos-alcaraz/a0e2/overview'Carlos Alcaraz/a/td td52-11/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/taylor-fritz/fb98/overview'Taylor Fritz/a/td td49-21/td /tr tr tda href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/casper-ruud/rh16/overview'Casper Ruud/a/td td49-22/td /tr /tbody/table/ppZverev led Rune 5-3 in the second set and looked set for a comfortable victory on Court Central, having dominated for large periods. However, Rune held serve and then broke Zverevrsquo;s serve for the first time in the match when trailing 4-5. The Dane then held in a mammoth 12-minute game but Zverev refused to fade./ppThe German, who hit 25 winners and won 84 per cent (37/44) of his first-serve points in the match according to Infosys ATP Stats, forced a tie-break and upped his aggression and intensity in the closing stages to advance./ppdiv style="position: relative; display: block; max-width: 100%;"div style="padding-top: 56.25%;"iframe src="https://players.brightcove.net/6057277721001/8gZSNwgH_default/index.html?videoId=6364117544112" allow="encrypted-media" style="position: absolute; top: 0px; right: 0px; bottom: 0px; left: 0px; width: 100%; height: 100%;"/iframe/div/div/ppRune won his maiden ATP Masters 1000 crown in Paris two years ago when he beat a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/novak-djokovic/d643/overview'Novak Djokovic/a in the title match. The Dane needed to lift the trophy in the French capital once again to keep alive his hopes of qualifying for the a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/nitto-atp-finals/605/overview'Nitto ATP Finals/a./ppZverev, who has advanced to 12 ATP Masters 1000 finals, leads Rune 3-1 in the pairrsquo;s Lexus ATP Head2Head series, having defeated the 21-year-old at a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/roland-garros/520/overview'Roland Garros/a and in Montreal earlier this season./ppstrongDid You Know?/strongbr /
Zverev will play for his fifth different ATP Masters 1000 title on Sunday. He has won Madrid twice, Rome twice, Montreal once and Cincinnati once./pp[NEWSLETTER FORM]/p