Valentin Vacherot arrives at Swiss Indoors Basel as newly crowned ATP Masters 1000 champion. Still, the breakthrough Rolex Shanghai Masters winner will need to be at his best from the start if he is to impress on his debut at the indoor hardcourt ATP 500.
Wild card Vacherot has been drawn against top seed Taylor Fritz in a blockbuster first-round match in Switzerland. The Monegasque, who is riding high at number 40 in the PIF ATP rankings after his fairytale Shanghai run, is playing only his seventh main draw at an ATP Tour event.
It could be a big week in Basel for Fritz, who sits fifth in the PIF ATP Live Race To Turin and is well placed to secure a spot at the Nitto ATP Finals. The American is pitted against sixth seed Jiri Lehecka in the quarter-finals and fourth seed Casper Ruud in the semi-finals.
Ruud, who is 11th in the Live Race and retains hopes of reaching Turin himself, begins his Basel title bid against a qualifier or lucky loser, while wild card Stan Wawrinka is a potential second-round opponent for the Norwegian. Former world number 3 and home favorite Wawrinka first plays Miomir Kecmanovic, who he leads 1-0 in the pair’s Lexus ATP Head2Head series.
In the bottom half of the draw, Fritz’s fellow Turin hopeful Ben Shelton opens against a qualifier. The second-seeded American, who is 37-19 in 2025 according to the Infosys ATP Win/Loss Index, reached the Basel championship match in 2024 before dropping Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard. Shelton is sixth in the Live Race and will be hoping to rediscover his best form after suffering a shoulder injury during the US Open at the end of August.
Want to explore the street art of Basel with Ben Ten?#benshelton | #SwissIndoorsBasel pic.twitter.com/nLzDah5erc
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Shelton could face fellow Turin Felix Auger-Aliassime, who is 10th in the Live Race, in the quarter-finals. The Canadian will hope that returning to a venue where he won back-to-back titles in 2022 and 2023 can inspire him again. The fifth-seeded Auger-Aliassime opens against his compatriot Gabriel Diallo.
Hot-serving Frenchman Mpetshi Perricard will take on #NextGenATP star Joao Fonseca in an intriguing first-round encounter that’s in the same quarter of the draw as third seed Holger Rune (who plays Marcos Giron) and seventh seed Jakub Mensik (who plays #NextGenATP star Henry Bernet at home).
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