Key events
And there was good news for Britain’s Henry Patten. He and doubles partner Harri Helivaara beat Wesley Koolhof & Nikola Mektic 4-6, 6-3, 12-10 to swing into the semis undefeated.
There’s currently a dramatic doubles match in play in Turin. After a 20- minute tie break, Max Purcell and Jordan Thompson won the first set against Marcel Granollers and Horacio Zeballos 16-14. The win means they are through to the semis (they only needed one set). Granollers and Zeballos are distraught.
And I should have said that last year’s losing finalist Sinner is already through to the knock-out stages, thanks to de Minaur winning the first set against Fritz.
Earlier today, America’s Taylor Fritz fought back after losing the first set to Australia’s Alex de Minaur, in the longest match of the week. Fritz pocketed the win: 7-5, 6-4, 6-3, and will make the semi-finals on Saturday unless Medvedev beats Sinner in straight sets. Yes, we’ve reached that logarithmic tables time of the tournament.
Preamble
Good evening! It’s day five of the ATP tour finals, the penultimate day of the round robin competition. Our match of the evening is Jannik Sinner against Daniil Medvedev, which is due to spring into squeaky-booted action around 7pm GMT.
Tickets for the finals have been selling like the hottest of hot cakes in Turin, with home boy Sinner, the Orange Fox, the most dazzlingly golden ticket of them all.
Sinner is still floating under a cloud of controversy after he tested positive for small amounts of clostebol in March. The International Tennis Integrity Agency independent panel verdict was that Sinner bore “no fault or negligence”, but WADA appealed the decision with CAS.
