Tien recognized that Shelton, who skipped the customary press conference after his second-round comeback against Reilly Opelka due to feeling unwell, “came out not feeling 100%, but he’s an amazing competitor and he came out and gave it his all.”
Nonetheless, Shelton used his big serve to keep the lead throughout the first set, until Tien won the first three points of the tiebreaker to wrestle away the set. In the third, the two players traded holds where they each saved a break point to start, before Tien won three straight games from 2-2 on the way to running his career record against Shelton to 2-0.
The two-hour and 10-minute win continued a recent trend of success for Tien against top players. He now owns a 6-5 career record against the game’s elite, but says he approaches every match, no matter the opponent, the same way. He takes an 0-1 head-to-head record against No. 18 seed Alejandro Davidovich Fokina into their fourth-round match as he seeks a first-ever ATP Masters 1000 quarterfinal.
