Alexander Zverev’s quest for a first grass-court title took an unexpected turn at the Halle Open on Friday when the German second seed was forced to sprint from court to vomit mid-match before rallying to defeat Italy’s Flavio Cobolli 6-4, 7-6 (8).
Zverev started the match on the front foot by breaking in the first game but as he was serving in the second, he requested a toilet break to throw up and bolted down the tunnel.
Once he returned, Zverev struggled with the intensity at first and clearly looked unwell, bending over in exhaustion after points and gasping for breath after a marathon rally.
“I felt fine before the match. Then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, I felt really, really bad. I felt ill, went to throw up and then 15 minutes later I felt OK again,” Zverev said.
“I don’t know what it was, I’ve never experienced that before. I hope I’ll be fine in the next couple of hours when the adrenaline settles. After that I think it was a pretty good match.”
Although nowhere near 100%, Zverev held serve as he slowly drew on his reserves of energy, firing his first ace of the match on set point.
The second set was an even contest as Cobolli relied on his movement to continue troubling Zverev, but the German eventually triumphed in a close tiebreak, finishing the match with 22 winners and 12 points at the net.
The semifinal will pit Zverev against Russian third seed Daniil Medvedev, a familiar foe who holds a 12-7 head-to-head advantage over him and has won their past three meetings.
“I think he’s the guy that I played the most in my career. I’m looking forward to it,” Zverev added.
“A lot of things happened in the last 18 months. He’s one of my toughest opponents in my career. It’s going to be a great match and I’m really looking forward to facing him.”
Medvedev moved into the semifinals with a 6-4, 6-3 victory over American Alex Michelsen despite suffering a nosebleed in the second set which forced the 2021 Halle runner-up to take a medical timeout.
However, the Russian served well to deny his opponent a single break point opportunity and wrapped up the contest in 85 minutes as he reached the last four without dropping a set, with the only thing causing problems being the shadows on the court.
“The shadows on the court made the conditions quite difficult. It took some time to get used to it. It was then better in the second set,” said Medvedev, who will return to the top 10 ahead of Wimbledon.
The other semifinal will feature 2023 champion Alexander Bublik — who knocked out last year’s winner Jannik Sinner in the previous round — taking on eighth seed Karen Khachanov, who beat Tomas Martin Etcheverry 6-3, 6-2.
Bublik fired 37 winners in his 7-6 (2) 6-3 victory over Tomas Machac, hitting passing shots with languid ease to entertain the crowd while he fired a searing backhand down the line on match point to advance.
“I served well, returned well. I’m happy that I was able to save a bit of energy,” Bublik said.
