ATP: Premiere! Dominic Thiem for the first time in the semi-final of Paris-Bercy

Dominic Thiem has reached the semi-finals of the ATP Masters 1000 tournament in Paris-Bercy for the first time. The Austrian defeated defending champion Jack Sock from the USA in three sets.

Premiere for Dominic Thiem. The Austrian number one is in the semi-finals for the first time at the traditionally last ATP Masters 1000 tournament of the year in the Paris-Bercy hall: Thiem beat Jack Sock 6:4, 4:6 and 6:4. Last year, the US-American had won the title in Bércy completely surprisingly.

Sock started the match much better and after a few minutes he was leading 4:1. Thiem made a small comeback, but had to give up his serve to 4:6 and lose the first set. The advantage for Sock? Again the US-American was allowed to start with the serve.

Thiem’s idea, which he had formulated after his success against Borna Coric, sounded as simple as it was promising: Sock was to be attacked via the weaker backhand. In fact, however, Sock moved better than seldom before in the past nine months and was able to dominate the points again and again with his forehand.

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In the fourth game of the second set, Thiem fended off two break points and could equal the score to 2:2. And immediately after that, he took his opponent’s serve. Thiem did not let this advantage be taken any more, but turned his third set point after 87 minutes.

Thiem and Sock had already faced each other in Paris-Bercy in 2016, when the 26-year-old from Lincoln, New England, had won in two sets. Thiem had won the other two encounters with Sock.

In the decision it was again the fifth game which gave a first indication about the further course of the match: Sock gave Thiem two break points with a double mistake, fended them off. Thiem took his fourth chance. At the score of 4:3 for the Austrian, Sock suddenly found two break points – Thiem countered with four points in a row. Sock had to change his shoes for the second time – and did not finish the match in the very best shoes. This came after a playing time of 2:14 hours. Dominic Thiem scored three match points and used the first one.

Karen Khachanov will be waiting in the semi-final on Saturday. In the first quarter-final of the day, the Russian had defeated an ailing Alexander Zverev 6-1 and 6-2.

Here the single tableau in Paris-Bercy