Alexander Zverev battled through a titanic three-set contest on Wednesday to advance at the Paris Masters.
Zverev, who recently contested the Vienna Open final, defeated world number 49 Camilo Ugo Carabelli 6-7, 6-1, 7-5.
This was a statement victory for the German, who fought from a break down in the final set to claim victory over his Argentine opponent.
After struggling to generate consistent form for most of the season, Zverev appears to have found his footing during the latter section of the ATP calendar.
However, the world number three came perilously close to falling at the hands of Ugo Carabelli and will want to avoid a similar scenario in the next round.
Zverev admits he underestimated Ugo Carabelli
At times during his second-round match, it seemed likely that Zverev would suffer yet another upset loss.
However, Zverev battled past Ugo Carabelli in Paris and will face 15th seed Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in the third round.
After the match against Ugo Carabelli, Zverev reflected on his win while noting a certain underestimation of his opponent.
As broadcast by Sky Sports, Zverev said: “Yeah, definitely (a good win), especially after a tough last week.
“I didn’t expect him to play the way he did to be honest with myself. Something that I have to learn from. I beat him quite easily in Rome, and he was nowhere near that level so, that’s a mistake from me and I have to prepare better for my opponents.”
Zverev comfortably defeated Ugo Carabelli at the 2025 Italian Open, winning their round of 64 contest 6-2, 6-1.
Zverev continued: “But he was fantastic today, he was serving incredible, playing the forehand unbelievable.
“His backhand slice was nasty on this surface so I’m happy with the win because it was definitely not easy.”
In 2025, the world number three has struggled to chase down Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner at the top of the rankings, frequently losing to significantly lower-ranked players at events.
Just this year, Zverev has lost to Alexandre Muller, Francisco Cerundolo and Arthur Rinderknech [twice].
However, the German can take great confidence heading into his third-round contest in Paris, as he demonstrated excellent fighting spirit to emerge victorious against Ugo Carabelli.
In fact, the week previous, Zverev struggled in his first-round match against Jacob Fearnley, before reaching the final.
Alexander Zverev equals Milos Raonic
According to OptaAce, among all players born since 1990, Alexander Zverev has equalled Milos Raonic for the second-most ATP Masters 1000 match wins on hard courts.
Zverev and Raonic, who have won 95 ATP Masters 1000 matches on hard courts, trail only Grigor Dimitrov, who has won 103.
In the next round, Zverev will play Alejandro Davidovich Fokina, who defeated home favourite Arthur Cazaux in the second round.
Zverev leads the Spaniard 5-1 in their head-to-head matchup. They last met at the 2025 Madrid Open, where Zverev triumphed 26 76(3) 76(0) in the round of 32.
