Jannik Sinner becomes first player to qualify for semifinals of ATP Finals after win over Zverev

Jannik Sinner has become the first player to qualify for the semifinals of this year's ATP Finals in Turin after a 6-4, 6-3 victory over Alexander Zverev in his second round-robin match of the week on Wednesday.

With that win, and with Felix Auger-Aliassime's win over Ben Shelton earlier in the day, the Bjorn Borg round-robin group records are now Sinner 2-0, Zverev 1-1, Auger-Aliassime 1-1 and Shelton 0-2, with Sinner advancing to the semifinals as group winner and Shelton eliminated.

The winner of Zverev against Auger-Aliassime on Friday will finish second in the group, and thus advance to the semifinals too.

Sinner's latest win also means he keeps his hopes of finishing the year at No. 1 alive—he'll be year-end No. 1 if he wins the title undefeated and if Carlos Alcaraz doesn't win another match in Turin this week.

Alcaraz plays his third round-robin match on Thursday against Lorenzo Musetti. If the Spaniard wins that, he clinches year-end No. 1.

Sinner had won his last four meetings in a row against Zverev, including two very contrasting matches over the last few weeks—a grueling 3-6, 6-3, 7-5 victory in the final of the ATP 500 in Vienna, then a 6-0, 6-1 rout in the semifinals of the Masters 1000 event in Paris.

This one was somewhere in between, as despite never being broken, he faced at least one break point in four different service games—including saving two in the very first game of the match, and digging out of triple break point down at 1-all, 0-40 in the second set.

In the end he was just too good in those pressure moments, though, fighting off all seven of Zverev's break points in the match, and breaking the German once per set en route to victory.

And it was a high quality match from both players. Zverev finished with more winners than unforced errors on the day, 17 to 16, while Sinner was on overdrive with a two-to-one ratio, 28 to 14.

Sinner's serve and forehand were particularly lethal—26 of his 28 winners came from those two shots (14 off the forehand and 12 aces).

"It was very, very competitive, a very close match," Sinner said in his on-court interview afterwards. "I felt like I was serving very, very well in the important moments today. I tried to play the best tennis possibile when it mattered, and fortunately today it went my way."

Sinner has now won his last five matches in a row against Zverev, his last seven matches in a row (and 14 sets in a row) at the ATP Finals, and his last 28 matches in a row on indoor hard courts.

He'll try to keep those last few streaks going on Friday as he takes on Shelton in his third and final round-robin match of the week.

The Italian has won his last seven matches in a row—as well as his last 17 sets in a row—against the big-serving American No. 1, but 11 of those 17 sets were 6-4 or closer, and six of them went to tie-breaks.