Auger-Aliassime and Rune stay red hot to reach Rolex Paris Masters semifinals

Felix Auger-Aliassime continued his incredible hot streak with a 6-1, 6-4 victory over Frances Tiafoe in the quarterfinals of the Rolex Paris Masters on Friday afternoon. Auger-Aliassime needed only one hour 33 minutes to put himself within one win of a fourth consecutive final.

The world No. 8 has triumphed in all three finals during this streak, so his winning streak now stands at 16 matches. After lifting trophies in Florence, Antwerp, and Belgium, he kicked off his Paris campaign by beating Mikael Ymer and Gilles Simon.

“I feel better and better,” Auger-Aliassime said. “I heard Novak (Djokovic) saying yesterday that you can always improve, and he’s won [21] Grand Slams. So I can definitely improve a lot more in future. Of course right now I’m playing well and feeling good, but I see things that I can still do better and still improve on to be able to top the game.”

Trying to match Auger-Aliassime win for win, Holger Rune is also bidding to reach four finals in a row. The 19-year-old Dane is still in the running to accomplish that feat after advancing on Friday when Carlos Alcaraz retired in a second-set tiebreaker. Rune was leading by a set and 3-1 in the ‘breaker at the time.

“It was a brilliant match from the start until the end,” the world No. 18 assured. “It was very unfortunate that he had to retire; unlucky for him, but I think we both played very well…. He’s No. 1, so he’s obviously the best in the world right now. But I’m super happy how I handled all the things under pressure. I was trying to play as aggressive as possible; sometimes I missed a few shots, but it was all worth it in the end because I was very good in the important moments.”

Rune–17-2 in his last 19 matches–remains on a roll after finishing runner-up in Sofia and Basel (the latter to Auger-Aliassime) and capturing the Stockholm title. He will get a chance for some revenge on semifinal Saturday.

“He’s almost the only guy I’ve lost to the last couple of weeks,” Rune said of the Canadian. “I lost to him last week; hopefully tomorrow is going to be different. I’m super excited and super pumped.”

Ricky contributes to 10sballs.com and also maintains his own tennis website, The Grandstand. You can follow him on twitter at @Dimonator.