Karen Khachanov snapped a five-match semi-final shedding streak on Monday on the Huafa Properties Zhuhai Championships, the place he defeated Sebastian Korda 7-5, 6-4 to succeed in his first title match of the season.
The highest seed, who final competed in a tour-level last in Adelaide in January 2022 (l. to Monfils), red-lined the ball all through the one-hour, 47-minute conflict. He edged a decent first set, gaining the essential break at 5-5 when Korda may solely discover the online with a drop shot.
Khachanov then put his foot down within the second set, hitting the ball with higher depth, weight and precision to dominate the baseline exchanges and enhance to 3-2 within the pair’s Lexus ATP Head2Head collection.
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The 27-year-old was competing for simply the fourth time in singles since his quarter-final match at Roland Garros, the place he suffered a stress fracture in his again. He fell within the first spherical on the US Open, however has recorded three wins in Zhuhai, additionally defeating Alex Bolt and Mackenzie McDonald.
The World No. 15 will meet Japanese star Yoshihito Nishioka or Aslan Karatsev within the championship match on Tuesday. Khachanov is aiming to win his first title since 2018 and fifth total. He has tasted success on Chinese language soil earlier than, lifting the trophy in Chengdu in 2016.
Korda was competing in his eighth tour-level semi-final and was aiming to succeed in his sixth last. The 23-year-old American is up 5 spots to No. 28 within the Pepperstone ATP Stay Rankings following his outcomes on the ATP 250 hard-court occasion.
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