Alexander Zverev exits Montreal as top seeds fall fast
Lost to Tallon Griekspoor in the second round of the Montreal Masters, where Canada’s Felix Auger-Aliassime also withdrew with a back injury. The quick exits…
MONTREAL — Alexander Zverev’s Montreal Masters campaign ended in the second round on Wednesday, when the top seed and world number three was beaten by Dutchman Tallon Griekspoor in three sets. The result came hours before Canadian favorite Felix Auger-Aliassime also left the field, stripping the tournament of its top two seeds in a single day.
That double exit changed the shape of the event quickly. A draw that had still carried heavy expectations suddenly lost two of its biggest names, and the pressure shifted to the players left standing in Montreal.
Griekspoor turns the match around
Zverev, this year’s French Open champion and Wimbledon runner-up, took the first set 7-6 (3/7), but Griekspoor fought back hard and won the next two sets 6-2, 6-4 for a second-round upset. The Dutchman, ranked world number 69, found more rhythm as the match wore on and pushed Zverev into uncomfortable rallies.
Zverev admitted afterward that the loss caught him badly. “I didn't expect to play well,” he said. “I also didn't expect to play this bad, to be honest.”
He also said the defeat stood out for the wrong reasons. “This was probably the worst match of the season,” Zverev said. “This one was up there as the worst.”
It was Zverev’s first match since his Wimbledon final loss to Jannik Sinner, and he faded in the second set against a player who kept pressing and refused to let the top seed settle. Griekspoor came within a point of building a 5-2 lead in the third set, but the match tightened again when he lost serve at 4-all.
The Dutch player did not blink. He broke straight back and then served out the match one game later for one of the biggest victories of his career.
Auger-Aliassime pulls out before night match
Auger-Aliassime, who was set for a night match in front of a home crowd, withdrew before the contest after injuring his back during training on Monday. The Montreal native said the timing was especially frustrating because he had trained in the city for two weeks without trouble.
“It was quite sudden. I was training here for two weeks and I had zero problems,” Auger-Aliassime said. “Just the timing is tough.”
He said he tried to ride it out day by day, but the injury did not ease. “I thought that day by day things would get better, but I tried to go on court today, I tried to warm up, and then I basically couldn't serve really, so it was impossible for me to think about even competing,” he said.
The withdrawal hit the tournament hard. Tournament director Valerie Tetreault said the event had hoped Auger-Aliassime would go deep, especially with several major names already missing before play began.
“I'm not going to lie, we were hoping that Felix was going to win at least a few matches,” Tetreault said. “He's definitely the player everybody was talking about and people wanted to know when he was going to play.”
Jannik Sinner, the world number one, and Novak Djokovic were already absent before the tournament started, leaving Montreal without two of the sport’s biggest stars. Zverev’s defeat and Auger-Aliassime’s withdrawal only deepened that void.
For the players still in the draw, the path just opened wider. For the tournament, the question shifted fast from star power to survival, with one of the biggest names already gone and the next rounds suddenly looking far more open than expected.
