STUTTGART, Germany (Reuters) -German top seed Alexander Zverev took out American third seed Ben Shelton with a 7-6(8) 7-6(1) victory in the semi-finals of the Stuttgart Open on Saturday to set up a showdown with Taylor Fritz.

This win marked Zverev’s first appearance in a grass-court final in eight years. The last time he accomplished that was at the ATP 500 event in Halle in 2017, where he lost the championship match to Roger Federer. The year before, the German star also reached the final there but was defeated by Florian Mayer.

Competing in Stuttgart for the first time since 2019, world no. 3 Alexander Zverev is through to his 39th ATP final. The home favorite faced newly-promoted top-10 player Ben Shelton in the semi-final.