High seed Ben Shelton received his Australian Open preparations again on observe Wednesday with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Hungary’s Fabian Marozsan on the Auckland Traditional, having suffered a sequence of first-round defeats in earlier tournaments.
The American world quantity 16 reached the quarter-final of the Australian Open, the final 4 on the US Open and secured a primary ATP title in Tokyo in his first full season on tour in 2023.
However the 21-year-old ended his marketing campaign with first-round exits in Vienna and Paris, earlier than one other first-up loss final week in Brisbane.
“It was undoubtedly a tricky match taking part in in opposition to Fabian,” mentioned Shelton after getting previous the world quantity 65 Marozsan in 71 minutes.
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“I had a tricky win in opposition to him final yr at a Challenger event. So actually cool to have a match-up first in opposition to him, he’s an amazing participant. It was a enjoyable match however completely happy to get by it.”
Shelton, who despatched down 10 aces, faces a quarter-final on Thursday in opposition to Spaniard Roberto Carballes Baena, who beat Austrian seventh seed Sebastian Ofner 7-5, 6-3, one in every of 4 seeds to tumble out on Wednesday.
Third-seed Francisco Cerundolo of Argentina was thrashed 6-1, 6-1 by France’s Alexandre Muller and eighth-seeded Australian Max Purcell misplaced 6-2, 6-4 to Japan’s Taro Daniel.
Fourth seed Felix Auger-Aliassime of Canada misplaced his first singles match of the yr 7-6 (11/9), 7-5 to German Daniel Altmaier.
Second-seeded Briton Cameron Norrie survived a scare from French teenager Luca Van Assche, successful 6-3, 6-7 (6/8), 6-1.
Norrie’s quarter-final can be in opposition to Chilean qualifier Alejandro Tabilo, who received previous Dutchman Botic van de Zandschulp 7-5, 6-3.