Zverev completely out of his mind: fans want him to take off his clothes

The begging of some fans to take off his T-shirt completely upset the otherwise confident Alexander Zverev. “After I win the tournament, I promise,” said the German tennis star after reaching the round of 16 at the Australian Open and added with a smile for good measure: “No, it was fun.”

The giggling in the Margaret Court Arena meant that Zverev could no longer concentrate on the questions from ex-player Andrea Petkovic after the 6:3, 6:4, 6:4 against Briton Jacob Fearnley. “Let me finish the interview, I beg you,” said the 2021 Olympic champion.

But that only caused more laughter. Zverev finally ended the interview with a smile. “Congratulations, you broke Sascha Zverev,” joked Petkovic.

In terms of sport, things look completely different. The 27-year-old made it into the round of the best 16 players for the sixth time in Melbourne. In doing so, Zverev equalized Boris Becker’s record for the most round of 16 appearances by a German tennis player.

However, the third round victory had one small flaw: the world number two conceded his first two breaks of the entire tournament. Zverev hasn’t given up a set yet, and Zverev was also able to save some energy against Fearnley despite a rather average performance.

The Hamburger’s next opponent is either Ugo Humbert or Arthur Fils. The two French will face each other in the round of 16 duel in the evening (local time).

Laura Siegemund, on the other hand, has said goodbye to the tournament. The 36-year-old had almost no chance in the third round against the Russian Anastasia Pavlyutschenkowa and lost 1:6, 2:6 after just 92 minutes.

For the world number 97, who has been focusing on doubles competitions for a long time, reaching the third round was a great success. On the way there, the Swabian beat, among others, the Chinese Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen and thus caused one of the biggest surprises of the tournament.

Before the match, Zverev said of Fearnley that he had “great respect” for the outsider: “I know that he is a young college player who has climbed up the rankings extremely quickly. That means he plays great tennis. “

At first there was little to be seen in the Margaret Court Arena. Zverev was the more dominant player, but also benefited from some of his opponent’s mistakes. Fearnley, who had knocked Australian tennis star Nick Kyrgios out of the competition in three sets in the first round, appeared to be handicapped by back problems.

After losing the first set, the 23-year-old took a longer break due to injury. The Scot returned to the pitch with a much more courageous style of play. After Zverev was able to take his opponent’s serve to 4:3 thanks to a net roller, he received the quick re-break. But Zverev countered in Fearnley’s next service game and finally took the set.

Both players also had problems getting their serves through in the third round. But ultimately Zverev’s higher quality clearly prevailed. After two hours, the German converted his first match point.