Michelsen stuns De Minaur, Tsitsipas starts title defence in Los Cabos

#NextGenATP American Alex Michelsen earned the biggest win of his career in style Wednesday in Los Cabos. 

The 19-year-old surged past third seed Alex de Minaur 6-4, 6-1 for the first Top 10 victory of his career. Michelsen stunned the No. 9 player in the Pepperstone ATP Rankings in one hour and 23 minutes to reach the quarter-finals of the ATP 500 and climb to first place in the Pepperstone ATP Live Race To Jeddah.

"I think I played about as well as I could," Michelsen said. "That's something to remember for sure."

A first Top 🔟 win 👏

19-year-old Alex Michelsen scores the biggest win of his career knocking out Alex de Minaur 6-4 6-1 to reach the quarter-finals.@CaboTennisOpen | #LosCabosTennisOpen pic.twitter.com/LJjuefQWEk

— ATP Tour (@atptour) February 22, 2024

De Minaur arrived in Mexico in top form after reaching the Rotterdam final behind wins against Top 15 players Andrey Rublev and Grigor Dimitrov. But his momentum came to a halt against the rising American.

Michelsen converted four of his six break points and won 51 per cent of his return points according to Infosys ATP Stats to trouble the Australian. He will next face eighth seed Jordan Thompson or American qualifier Emilio Nava. 

The 2023 Next Gen ATP Finals qualifier Michelsen is in great position to make a return to Jeddah this year, sitting in first place ahead of Shang Juncheng. Michelsen had lost his only previous Lexus ATP Head2Head clash against a Top 10 opponent earlier this year in the third round of the Australian Open when he fell to Alexander Zverev, who will also be in action Wednesday evening in Los Cabos.

Defending champion Stefanos Tsitsipas also moved on with a commanding 6-3, 6-0 triumph against Australian Aleksandar Vukic.

“Great to be back. Thank you guys,” Tsitsipas said. “It was fun playing out here tonight. Thank you for your support. I’m happy that I got such a good win and showed the best of my tennis. I thank you for every single point that you’ve been cheering me on.”

The second seed saved all three break points he faced to reach the quarter-finals. Last year he lost just one set en route to the Los Cabos crown and will hope to lift the trophy again this week.

Tsitsipas will next play American qualifier Aleksandar Kovavevic, who clawed past Australian Rinky Hijikata 6-3, 4-6, 6-4. Kovacevic will try to make his second ATP Tour semi-final after advancing to the last four in Seoul last year.

Top seed Alexander Zverev made a quick start to his tournament with a 6-3, 6-0 win against lefty Yoshihito Nishioka. He won 77 per cent of his service points.

Zverev said of his serve: "It's a shot that I've been working on over the last four, five years because sometimes it was a shot that made me lose a lot of matches, made me lose also a few very big matches, maybe like the US Open final. So I'm happy it's working. I'm happy that the work is paying off."

The German will try to maintain his form in the last eight against Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis, who eliminated Briton Daniel Evans 6-4, 6-2. 

Fourth seed Casper Ruud eliminated in-form American Marcos Giron 6-1, 6-0.