Zverev and Cobolli set up quarter-final rematch as Italy’s clay season grows richer
Zverev (No 2) beat Mensik (No 23) 6-4, 6-7 (4), 6-3 and Cobolli (No 10) beat Medvedev (No 7) 6-3, 5-7, 6-4. A fortnight ago in Munich, Cobolli beat Zverev 6-3, 6-3. On Wednesday in Madrid, they do it again – and this time a semi-final place is the prize.
Flavio Cobolli, Madrid 2026 | © Madrid Trophy Promotion
Alexander Zverev, the second seed, and Flavio Cobolli, the No 10 seed, will meet in the quarter-finals of the Mutua Madrid Open after both won three-set battles on Tuesday night – a rematch of a Munich semi-final that Cobolli won just two weeks ago.
Zverev beat Czech Jakub Mensik, the No 23 seed, 6-4, 6-7 (4), 6-3 in two hours and 19 minutes, ending a three-year run of fourth-round exits at this tournament. The German broke Mensik’s serve in the opening game, won the first set in 38 minutes losing only three points on his first delivery, then was taken to a tiebreak in the second before reasserting in the third.
Zverev’s track record
Mensik broke for 2-1 in the decider, stretching across the court to end a rally with a forehand volley – a moment of quality from a player who had won five tiebreaks in a row during the week. Zverev broke back immediately and won five of the last six games.
The win extended Zverev’s record at the Caja Mágica to 28-6 and made him the second man this decade – after Jannik Sinner earlier in the day – to reach the quarter-finals at each of the first four Masters 1000 events of a season. Alongside Sinner, they are the first pair to achieve that at five or more consecutive Masters events since Novak Djokovic and Tomas Berdych at Monte-Carlo in 2015.
Earlier on Tuesday, Cobolli had produced the performance of his week, closing out a 6-3, 5-7, 6-4 win over Daniil Medvedev, his first top-10 win on clay and his third of his career. He won 12 of the last 13 points to seal it, breaking Medvedev’s serve in the ninth game of the third set to take control.
Arriving in Madrid’s European clay swing having gone 1-16 against top-10 opponents in his career, he has now beaten three of them in a fortnight – Zverev in Munich, and Medvedev and the rest here. He is ranked No 13 and could end the week inside the top 12 regardless of Wednesday’s result.
Zverev leads their head-to-head 2-1. The most recent entry in that series was Munich, where Cobolli won 6-3, 6-3 without dropping serve. Neither player will have forgotten it.
