Novak Djokovic overcame having to play twice in a day and romped into the Rome Masters final with a 6-1 6-0 drubbing of Dominic Thiem. The Serb will play German rising star Alexander Zverev in Sunday’s showpiece.Djokovic, the four-time champion, was forced to finish his quarterfinal over Juan Martin del Potro earlier in the day after their match was rained off late on Friday.
Tennis: Djokovic thrashes Thiem to reach Rome Masters final
By-dailynewsegypt
Sports
00:05
Monday ,22 May 2017
But the setback seemed only to inspire the 30-year-old second seed, as he set up what is expected to be a mouthwatering final, and first meeting, with Zverev.
“It was my best performance of the year,” said Djokovic after his 59-minute win over Thiem, who had stunned clay king Rafa Nadal in the quarterfinals.
Zverev earlier won a battle of the giants to down unseeded American John Isner 6-4 6-7(5) 6-1 to reach his debut Masters final.
The 20-year-old German’s victory made him the youngest ATP Masters 1000 finalist since a 19-year-old Djokovic in Miami in 2007.
Zverev had looked like wrapping up the match in straight sets after romping through the opener in under half an hour, but a defiant Isner forced a rethink when he took the second set down to a tiebreak.
The German was 5-0 down in the tiebreak but battled back before Isner took the match to a third set with a forehand winner.
Isner, the first American to reach the semi-finals in Rome since Andy Roddick in 2008, had a chance to break with Zverev leading 3-1 in the final set but the German snuffed out the challenge.
In the women’s event, French Open champion Garbine Muguruza retired with a neck injury, with Ukraine’s Elina Svitolina going through to a final against Romania’s sixth seed Simona Halep.
Spaniard Muguruza called her trainer and then a doctor 22 minutes into her semi-final with Svitolina leading 4-1 at the Foro Italico in Rome. It was her fourth retirement of the season after Miami, Brisbane and Dubai.
Halep had earlier made light of heavy conditions to secure a 7-5 6-1 victory over Dutch 15th seed Kiki Bertens.