Carreno Busta of Spain defeated Canada’ s Denis Shapovalov in a roller-coaster of a five - setter to reach the US Open semi -finals early Wednesday .
The 20th seed overcame his 12th - seeded opponent 3-6, 7- 6 ( 7/5) , 7-6 ( 7/4) , 0-6, 6- 3 in 4hr 8min inside Arthur Ashe Stadium .
The Spaniard will play fifth seed Alexander Zverev of Germany , who progressed to the semis earlier Tuesday, for a place in Sunday ’ s final.
“ I ’ m destroyed, but I ’ m very , very happy after this fight , this battle , ” said Carreno Busta, who was a US Open semi -finalist in 2017.
He said it was “ incredible” to be back in the last- four again after working “ very , very hard” with his coach during the quarantine shutdown.
Carreno Busta admitted though that fortune was on his side at times in the match.
“ I was a little bit lucky here , ” the 29-year- old said .
Shapovalov was undone by ill -timed double faults and misplaced shots during key moments of the match .
His service game was particularly wayward during the two tie - break sets he lost.
Shapovalov hit 11 double faults while Carreno Busta had only one .
The Canadian smashed 76 winners compared to just 33 by the Spaniard.
But Shapovalov was also his own worst enemy , recording a whopping 77 unforced errors to the 42 hit by Carreno Busta.
The tie -break sets that Carreno Busta won were a test of endurance, lasting 77 and 68 minutes .
When Shapovalov sprinted to a 6- 0 win in the fourth set in just 28 minutes , the writing seemed to be on the wall for the Spanish player.
But after a medical timeout, he surged to a 5- 2 lead in the deciding set before a couple of errant forehands by Shapovalov in the final game handed Carreno Busta victory.
He had progressed to the quarter -final match by default after Novak Djokovic was disqualified during their last- 16 match for accidentally hitting a line judge in the throat with a ball.
The disqualification of Djokovic blew the men’ s competition at Flushing Meadows wide open .
His departure means the US Open will crown a first -time Grand Slam winner on Sunday .
In Wednesday ’ s quarter- final matches, second seed Dominic Thiem plays Australia’ s Alex de Minaur and third seed Daniil Medvedev takes on Russian compatriot Andrey Rublev .
( AFP)
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