Washington Open: Taylor Fritz And Daniil Medvedev Exit At Quarter-final Stage As Ben Shelton Advances

Taylor Fritz and Daniil Medvedev were two big-name casualties in the Washington Open quarter-finals on Friday, as Ben Shelton and Alex de Minaur advanced.

Top seed Fritz was beaten 7-6 (7-3) 3-6 7-5 by Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, losing the last five games of a three-hour epic that finished just before 02:00 Washington time.

Fritz served for the match at 5-3 up in the deciding set, but Davidovich Fokina rallied to break before edging two marathon games and completing a love hold for the victory.

Davidovich Fokina will face another American in the last four, after Ben Shelton beat his compatriot Frances Tiafoe 7-6 (7-2) 6-4.

Tiafoe served for the opening set at 6-5 up, but Shelton fought back to force a tie-break, which he dictated before edging a hard-fought second set.

Shelton, who is seeded fourth for the event, now holds a 3-1 advantage over Tiafoe in the pair's head-to-head.

"We know tennis is a long journey. We’re going to play each other a bunch of times," Shelton said of Tiafoe.

"We've already played on the hard courts, we've already played twice at the US Open, and he beat me the most recent time. It's tough not to cheer for a guy like that."

The other semi-final matchup will be between Alex de Minaur and Corentin Moutet, after the former beat Brandon Nakashima 6-4 6-4 and the latter downed Medvedev.

Moutet – a lucky loser at the ATP 500 event – triumphed 1-6 6-4 6-4 in a match that was halted for an hour due to lightning in the area, when the Frenchman was just a game away from victory.

He returned from the delay to convert his third match point with a majestic lob, reaching his first semi-final above ATP 250-level.

Data Debrief: Double faults cost Daniil

The one-hour delay for lightning certainly affected Medvedev, who committed three double faults in the resumed game to hand Moutet a route to victory.

The Russian committed 10 double faults overall, compared to just three for his opponent, while only winning 51% of first-serve points on another difficult outing.