Ben Shelton takes down Francis Tiafoe in DC Open quarter-finals
Ben Shelton continued his dominant run at the Mubadala Citi DC Open on Friday night with a 7-6(2), 6-4 victory over Francis Tiafoe, who was the hometown favorite in Washington.
Shelton and Tiafoe are no strangers to one another. They played doubles together a few days ago and have now met four times in ATP Tour events.
"We know tennis is a long journey. We’re going to play each other a bunch of times. Especially, we’ve already played on the hard courts, we’ve already played twice at the US Open, and he beat me the most recent time. It's tough not to cheer for a guy like that,” Shelton said.
The first set stayed on serve until the 11th game, when Tiafoe broke Shelton to love. The former Florida Gator bounced back immediately, breaking Tiafoe and forcing a tie-break. Shelton used his power forehand to claim the first set, delivering a 144 mph serve in the process.
Shelton broke first in the second set at 3-3, and it was cruise control from there. The win puts Shelton ahead, 3-1, in the Head2Head series. Shelton already secured the No. 7 spot on the rankings by making the quarter-finals, but every win gets him closer and closer to No. 6 Novak Djokovic, who many consider to be the greatest of all time. It's a 600-point gap to close, but winning this tournament would cut that number in half.
Winning the Washington 500 seems very doable with top-seeded Taylor Fritz falling in the quarters against Alejandro Davidovich Fokina. Shelton is now the highest-seeded player remaining in the tournament. Still, he will have to get by Davidovich Fokina before facing the winner of the 7-seed Alex de Minaur vs. lucky loser Corentin Moutet.
De Minaur and Moutet are scheduled to begin not before 7 p.m. ET, and Shelton vs. Davidovich Fokina will follow — so drink some coffee. Fans can watch the match on the Tennis Channel using cable or streaming, and the TennisTV app is also an option (subscription required).
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This article originally appeared on Gators Wire: Florida Gators tennis Ben Shelton vs Francis Tiafoe DC Open recap
