Zverev showed resilience on multiple occasions at the Chengdu Open this week. The German player had a tough battle against his first-round opponent Pavel Kotov before coming back from a set down against Miomir Kecmanovic in the second round.
He achieved his first and only straight-sets victory of the tournament in the semi-finals where he ousted World No. 19 Grigor Dimitrov, extending his head-to-head lead against the Bulgarian player to 7-1.
In what was his 32nd final on the ATP Tour, Zverev clashed with Roman Safiullin, who was making his debut in an ATP final. The two 26-year-olds battled it out across three sets, with the Russian winning the first set on a tiebreak.
However, the former World No. 2 has experience in coming back during a match, having defeated Jannik Sinner at the US Open earlier this month in a grueling five-set thriller that lasted over four and a half hours. Therefore, he was able to level the match by winning the tiebreak in the second set before taking the final set 6-3.
Following his victory at the ATP 250 event, former World No. 1 Becker, who has six Grand Slam titles to his name, congratulated his compatriot on social media.
The 55-year-old shared a photo of Zverev's victory along with the caption "Glückwunsch Sascha," which translates to "Congratulations Sascha," in English, with Sascha being a nickname for Alexander.
Zverev is now preparing to compete at the China Open in Beijing, where the field is stacked with Top 10 and Top 20-ranked players. He will be the eighth seed at the ATP 500 tournament and will hope to continue his success on the Asian Swing with a first-round match against Diego Schwartzman.
🏆 Hamburg
SF in Cincinnati
QF at US Open
🏆 Chengdu
📈 Back in the Top 10
What if Alexander Zverev was the man of the end of the season (and of the next one)?