Zverev defeats injured Fritz to set up Fery meeting

Alexander Zverev produced a dominant display to end his dismal losing streak against an injured Taylor Fritz and reach his first Wimbledon semi-final.

The second seed had lost his previous seven encounters with Fritz and trailed 10-5 in their head-to-head 10-5, which included two defeats at the All England Club.

But with the American hampered by a knee injury, Zverev capitalised with a near-perfect performance to claim a 6-4 6-4 6-2 victory on Court One - his first win over Fritz in over two years.

A month after winning his maiden Grand Slam singles title at the French Open, Zverev is now only two wins away from a second major trophy and the German held his arms aloft after securing victory in just under two hours.

"He has been beating me for two years straight and I'm very happy to be in the semi-finals after finally getting a win," Zverev said.

"Of course it's in the back of your mind that you haven't beaten an opponent for more than two years, he has beaten you a lot of times in a row.

"That is always something you have in your mind, but today I knew I had to play a flawless match, I had to play an almost perfect match to have a chance and I felt like I did that today."

Zverev will face Arthur Fery in Friday's semi-final after the British wildcard defeated Italy's Flavio Cobolli, the runner-up to Zverev in last month's Roland Garros final.

As Zverev served for the match, news of Fery's triumph drifted across to Court One, carried by cheers from Centre Court and the Hill.

"It is OK, you guys can all be for Fery - I understand and don't have a problem with it," Zverev said when asked about his last-four opponent.

"For him it is a fairytale story - a fairytale for Arthur Fery, see what I did there?

"I have to trust myself and trust my tennis and see what happens."

Fritz missed the bulk of the European clay swing because of knee tendonitis. His team refused to travel with him, unless he took some time to recover.

He played two matches on the red dirt, losing both, but the 28-year-old hit a rich vein of form in the build-up to Wimbledon, reaching the final in grass-court events at Stuttgart and Halle, where he got the better of Zverev in the semi-finals.

However, Fritz looked laboured from the off in Wednesday's quarter-final, dropping serve early and struggling to cope with the power coming off Zverev's racquet.

After losing the first set, Fritz - a semi-finalist at Wimbledon last year - called for the physio at the start of the second, grimacing as he received a massage to his right knee.

Fritz said he was "really sad" that he could not put his best foot forward against Zverev.

"I don't want to take away from how well he's playing. I'm not saying the result would have been any different," he said.

"I was just panicking. I didn't expect it at all.

"Because I was thinking about the knee, my focus was kind of all over the place."

While he continued playing and seemed to be moving well, he was no match for Zverev and he won just eight points on the German's serve in the final two sets.

Zverev, who twice broke Fritz's serve in the third set, brought up two match points with his 14th ace of the match and he converted the first one with another unreturnable serve before sharing a warm embrace with his opponent at the net.