As a wild card entry for the China Open, Zhang Ze’s run came to an end after he was defeated by Florian Mayer of Germany in the quarter finals. The 22 year old Chinese player was ranked 165th in the world.
Ze created history when he reached the last 16 of the tournament, and became the first Chinese man to beat a top 20 player; which resulted in an exit of Richard Gasquet of France. The French player was ranked 14th in the world, and the defeat meant that Zhang was the first player from China to reach the quarter final of an ATP event, since Pan Bing made the semi finals in Seoul in the year 1995.
Zhang, while talking about his defeat with Mayer said, “Mayer has a lot of force in the forehand but his backhand is still good and he made a lot of changes to the slice of the ball which really affected my rhythm”. The world number 29 Mayer, won the match 6-3, 6-4.
The Chinese player added, “I couldn’t work out an effective strategy to work against him.” Zhang was supported by the home crowd and had won three games in a row to win the opening set. In the opening round, the Chinese player had defeated Wu Di 6-4, 6-1.
