Zverev exacts Munich revenge on Cobolli to reach fourth Madrid semi-final

Alexander Zverev, the second seed, dismissed Italian Flavio Cobolli, the No 10 seed, 6-1, 6-4 on Thursday evening to reach the semi-finals of the Mutua Madrid Open and avenge his semi-final defeat in Munich twelve days ago.

There was nothing of Munich in this rematch. Cobolli, who had beaten Zverev 6-3, 6-3 in Bavaria and arrived in Madrid having also eliminated Medvedev in the quarter-finals, was absent for almost the entire first set. Zverev raced to 5-0 in 28 minutes, won the set 6-1 with Cobolli managing only 12 points, and the Italian’s serve offered him no platform to rebuild.

He converted just 49 per cent of points on his first delivery. Cobolli did not earn a single break point until the final game of the match, when he had two opportunities at 5-4 down. Zverev closed it with four consecutive points. “Things can change quickly in sport,” Zverev said. “He had played incredibly well in Munich.”

The win was Zverev’s fourth Madrid semi-final, a tournament where he lifted the title in 2018 and 2021 and lost the final to Alcaraz in 2022. With the victory, he surpasses Mischa Kohlschreiber’s record of 178 clay-court wins to become the all-time leader among German men in the Open Era. He reaches the semi-finals at each of the first four Masters 1000 events of 2026 – alongside Sinner, the only player to achieve that this season.

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