STUTTGART, Germany (Reuters) -German top seed Alexander Zverev beat Frenchman Corentin Moutet 6-2 7-6(7) on Thursday to reach the Stuttgart Open quarter-finals, staying on course in his Wimbledon tune-up after a quarter-final run at Roland Garros.
Zverev has long struggled on grass. The 28-year-old has won 24 tour-level titles but none on grass and has never gone past the fourth round at Wimbledon.
Zverev, a three-times Grand Slam finalist, raced through the first set, but Moutet responded well in the second, taking an early 2-1 lead.
The set tightened as both players traded breaks to reach 4-4, before Zverev held his nerve in the tiebreak to close out the match.
“I prefer to win 6-2 6-2, but you can never choose these kind of things but in the end I won and that’s the most important thing,” said Zverev, who last played at Stuttgart in 2019.
“I think the first match on grass was never easy. I honestly think it was a very average match. I made it complicated, but a win is a win and I’m happy to play tomorrow again.”
Fourth seed Felix Auger-Aliassime earned his first win on grass since Halle in 2022, defeating Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard 6-4 6-4 to move into the quarter-finals in Stuttgart. The 24-year-old Canadian will next face German teenager Justin Engel.
Wildcard Engel, who won his first tour-level grasscourt match in the previous round, stunned American seventh seed Alex Michelsen 6-4 6-4, breaking for 2-1 in both sets and holding serve throughout without facing a single break point.
The 17-year-old Engel becomes the youngest Stuttgart quarter-finalist and also the youngest player to reach the quarter-finals of an ATP grasscourt event since 1985, when Boris Becker made it to the Wimbledon quarter-finals.
(Reporting by Shifa Jahan in BengaluruEditing by Toby Davis)
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