Top seed Alexander Zverev feels no anxiety over his losing record against Alexander Bublik heading into their fourth-round meeting at the Rolex Shanghai Masters Tuesday.
The German trails the mercurial Bublik 1-3 in career meetings, but they haven’t played since meeting on grass in Halle in 2023. Like the surface, much has changed since then.
Zverev is now a two-time Grand Slam champion and, after Carlos Alcaraz’s loss to Zizou Bergs on Monday, guaranteed to become the first German to finish year-end No. 1 at the end of the season.
“I think the head-to-head matchup is a bit irrelevant if it's more than three years ago," Zverev said. "I'm expecting a difficult match. I'm expecting a tough battle, but I'm looking forward to the challenge.”
In the third round, Zverev needed three sets to defeat Frenchman Quentin Halys, another player who has caused him problems.
Bublik will be high on confidence after a third-set tie-break win over Brandon Nakashima on Sunday and loves performing before a big centre-court crowd.
Look for the serve to dominate this high-octane clash, which leads off the night session at 6 p.m. local.
Kicking off the day session, Australian Alex de Minaur and Karen Khachanov will fight for the first of four quarter-final spots to be decided on Day 7.
De Minaur came into the tournament under an injury cloud after retiring in his Beijing semi-final against Novak Djokovic with a groin injury. But given two extra days to recover here due to a walkover in his opening match, the World No. 6 has been able to work his way into the tournament.
“It was great to get those extra two days. I ultimately ended up having five days in between matches. I put a lot of recovery in, a lot of hours to get myself ready,” De Minaur said after his third-round win over Rei Sakamoto.
“I'm sure in a couple days time it will feel even better, so I'm very excited about that.”
In a heavy-hitting battle between two of the game’s best young players, former Miami Open champion Jakub Mensik will play Frenchman Arthur Gea, who is into the fourth round in his ATP Masters 1000 debut after upsetting Ben Shelton.
Hubert Hurkacz, the 2023 champion, has been serving bombs this week and will look to replicate that in his clash with Spaniard Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, who edged Frances Tiafoe in a third-set tie-break late Sunday night and finds himself again closing out the night session.
Hurkacz, the former World No. 6, has dropped 50 aces in his first three matches, including 13 in a straight-sets win over Novak Djokovic in the second round.
