Second-seeded Carlos Alcaraz saw his title defence and 14-match winning streak in Madrid come to an end at the hands of Andrey Rublev in the quarter-finals on Wednesday while top-seeded Jannik Sinner withdrew from the tournament citing a right hip injury.
Rublev upset home favourite Alcaraz 4-6, 6-3, 6-2 to reach the semi-finals.
The seventh-seeded Rublev had lost his last five matches against top-three opposition and was 0-1 head-to-head against Alcaraz coming into the contest.
He was also on a four-match losing streak heading into the Madrid Open.
All that seemed like a distant memory in the quarter-finals against Alcaraz as Rublev maximised on his powerful brand of tennis to shock the Spanish world number three and reach the semi-finals at a seventh different Masters 1000 tournament, from a full set of nine.
