Ben Shelton’s run at Wimbledon came to an end on Wednesday with a 7-6, 6-4, 6-4 loss to World No. 1 Jannik Sinner in the men’s quarterfinals.
The Gainesville tennis player, who recently moved into the top 10 ATP rankings, cruised in the first three rounds without a loss to advance to the round of 16.
He defeated Italy’s Lorenzo Sonego 3-6, 6-1, 7-6, 7-5 on Monday in the fourth round of singles play to advance to his first Wimbledon quarterfinal.
The first set against Sinner ended in a tiebreaker, and Shelton went up 2-0, but the Italian seized the momentum thanks to his serving.
Neither player broke serve in the first set, which resulted in it lasting 13 games, and the final two sets each went 10 games. Shelton served 14 aces with his fastest serve reaching 144 mph.
Sinner won 50 of his 56 first serve points and 20 of his 30 second serve points, compared to Shelton’s 48 out of 60 and 17 out of 41.
Sinner had just 17 unforced errors compared to Shelton’s 38.
“I’m very, very happy about today’s performance,” Sinner said on Court 1 following the match. “Playing against him is so difficult…he serves very well as we saw in the last game. We play each other now more and more, and we know each other a little bit better, and I’m looking forward to these kind of battles.”
Shelton, a two-time semifinalist in Grand Slam events (the 2023 U.S. Open and the 2025 Australian Open), dropped to 0-12 against top three seeds in major tournaments and has lost 15 straight sets to Sinner.
Two years ago, the Buchholz grad became the youngest American man in three decades to advance to the U.S. Open semifinals. In 2022, Shelton won the NCAA singles title for UF.
Sinner improved to 16-0 against Americans in the majors, including 20 straight wins since losing to Shelton in their first meeting at the 2023 Shanghai Masters. Coming into the Wimbledon semifinals, he has amassed a 25-1 record in his last four majors, winning the 2024 U.S. Open and the 2025 Australian Open and reaching the finals of this year’s French Open.
He will face No. 6 seed Novak Djokovic on Friday in the semifinals. A win could set up a potential No. 1 vs. No. 2 for the title.
Djokovic, a winner of 24 Grand Slam singles titles, defeated No. 22 seed Flavio Cobolli 6-7, 6-2, 7-5, 6-4 in Wednesday’s quarterfinal.
The Serbian has reached the final in his last six Wimbledon appearances and has 14 career semifinal appearances, which is a new men’s Wimbledon record.
Only one American remains at Wimbledon.
Taylor Fritz, the No. 5 seed, will face Spanish tennis player and 2025 French Open champion Carlos Alcaraz, the No. 2 seed, in the other men’s semifinal on Friday.
The last American man to win any major was Andy Roddick (2003 U.S. Open), while the last American man to win Wimbledon was Pete Sampras in 2000.
Alcaraz has won the last two Wimbledon titles, while Djokovic won the previous four.