Alexander Zverev is into the semifinals. Carlos Alcaraz, meanwhile, needs to wait to see if he will reach the last four at the ATP Finals.
Zverev beat Alcaraz 7-6 (5), 6-4 on Friday in Turin, Italy, at the season-ending event for the year’s top eight players.
Zverev won the group, finishing perfect with three victories. Alcaraz and Casper Ruud have one win each and Andrey Rublev has none.
Alcaraz needs Rublev to beat Ruud in the final group match later.
Top-ranked Jannik Sinner won the other group ahead of Taylor Fritz.
So Zverev will face Fritz in one semifinal and Sinner will likely face Ruud or Alcaraz in the other.
Alcaraz again wore a pink nose strip after coming to Turin sick and having struggled with breathing issues in his opening loss to Ruud.
It was a measure of revenge for Zverev, who was beaten by Alcaraz in five sets in this year’s French Open final.
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Kyrgios set for return in Australia next month
Nick Kyrgios says he will make a return to competitive tennis at the Brisbane International beginning Dec. 29 after playing only one ATP Tour match in more than two years.
The 29-year-old Kyrgios has been mostly sidelined with career-threatening wrist and knee injuries since the 2022 U.S. Open quarterfinals.
That run came six weeks after reaching the Wimbledon final when he came closest to winning a Grand Slam singles championship before losing in four sets to Novak Djokovic.
Currently unranked, the one-time 13th-ranked player said he was excited to resume his career in front of home fans.
“Honestly, this is probably the best I’ve felt in two years,” Kyrgios told a Melbourne television station Friday. “I played that amazing year in 2022. Then at the finals in Wimbledon and U.S. Open, that’s when I started feeling some issues in my wrist. I had that wrist reconstruction and now I’m feeling amazing.”
Also stating his intentions to play in the 2025 Australian Open in Melbourne, Kyrgios said he’s planning to compete in the World Tennis League exhibition event in Abu Dhabi from Dec. 19-22, with the mixed team event also attracting players such as Iga Swiatek, Casper Ruud, Aryna Sabalenka, Taylor Fritz and Daniil Medvedev.
Kyrgios was a late withdrawal from the Australian Open in 2023 due to a knee injury that required surgery, before having to pull out of the French Open later that year with a foot issue.
A winner of seven titles on the ATP Tour, He subsequently tore a ligament in his wrist that also needed surgery with his last tour match a short-lived return to grass at Stuttgart in June 2023.
