Korda holds off Shelton to battle into Shanghai semi-finals

SHANGHAI, Oct 12 (AFP): Sebastian Korda reached his first Masters semi-final as he battled back to tame fast-rising fellow American Ben Shelton 6-7 (10/12), 6-2, 7-6 (8/6) in Shanghai on Thursday.
The 26th seed finally sealed the quarter-final on his sixth match point and plays Poland's 16th seed Hubert Hurkacz for a place in Sunday's final.
With the centre-court roof closed because of rain in Shanghai, the first set went to a tie break after they exchanged breaks in the 11th and 12th games. US Open semi-finalist Shelton, who uncorked a serve clocked at 236 kilometres per hour earlier in the set, had Korda on the back foot throughout a gripping tie break. The pressure finally told when the recently turned 21-year-old Shelton unleashed an ace on his fifth set point that Korda could only watch whizz by.
The 23-year-old Korda, whose father Petr reached two in the world at his peak, recovered to break Shelton's big serve at the start of the second set and raced to level the quarter-final at one set all.
Korda broke the 19th seed at the start of the deciding set and then dug himself out of a hole, saving three break points to extend his lead to 3-1 and then 4-2.