David Goffin issues heartwarming message after Alex Zverev win as retirement update given

David Goffin has admitted he is motivated to carry on playing tennis to prove to his three-week-old baby daughter that he can still mix it with the best players on the ATP Tour. The 33-year-old stunned world No. 3 Alexander Zverev 6-4, 7-5 at the Shanghai Masters on Wednesday to book his place in the quarter-finals of the tournament.

Goffin, who reached the last-eight at Wimbledon in 2019 and 2022, has mainly competed on the Challenger Tour in recent years and has fallen to No. 66 in the world.

But he rolled back the years against Zverev to become the fourth lowest-ranked quarter-finalist in the history of the Shanghai Masters.

And following his victory, Goffin explained: "I wanted to show my daughter that I can be a good tennis player.

"We tried to find a few more years to show her that I can still play tennis, and that's the case for the moment. Even if she doesn't realise yet, hopefully she will come and watch a little bit.

"Sometimes you have doubts about your fitness and your head. If you're not 100 per cent there, mentally, it's tough to compete with those guys - the level is so high.

"I have put a lot of hard work in [over] the past few months and there is no [surprise] the tennis came back. And I am really happy to be back again in the quarter-finals of an ATP Masters 1000."

Goffin had already defeated James Duckworth, Lorenzo Musetti and Marcos Giron in China ahead of his clash with Zverev. And he is now set to take on American star Taylor Fritz for a place in the last-four.

Fritz has been in impressive form this year and last month after progressing to the quarters at the Australian Open and Wimbledon earlier in the year.

And Goffin added: "I have built confidence from the beginning of the tournament. Match after match, I was playing better and I just came on the court and tried to play my best tennis [against Zverev].

"[I tried] to stick to the plan that I had with my coach and it worked. Even though he came back with some good rallies, I just tried to stay positive because I was on the right way to winning the match.

"It paid off in the end with a really good service game to finish, so I am really happy with the win."