{"id":235754,"date":"2026-01-16T04:12:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T04:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/235754\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T04:12:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T04:12:08","slug":"asb-classic-sebastian-baez-stuns-top-seed-ben-shelton-in-auckland-quarter-finals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/235754\/","title":{"rendered":"ASB Classic: Sebastian Baez stuns top seed Ben Shelton in Auckland quarter-finals"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/a1df49a0-596d-4a6d-9725-6f2be4aac937.png\" alt=\"Michael Burgess\" class=\"rounded-full object-cover h-[3.4375rem] w-[3.4375rem] min-w-[3.4375rem]\" data-test-ui=\"author--details__image\"\/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nzherald.co.nz\/author\/michael-burgess\/\" class=\"text-sys-text-dark underline underline-offset-3\" rel=\"author nofollow noopener\" data-test-ui=\"author--link\" target=\"_blank\">Michael Burgess<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Senior Sports Journalist\u00b7NZ Herald\u00b7<\/p>\n<p>16 Jan, 2026 01:08 AM2 mins to read<\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to listenAccess to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.Subscribe now<\/p>\n<p>\u200c<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#\" class=\"flex cursor-pointer items-center gap-1.5 text-black\" data-test-ui=\"social-link--bookmark-above\" aria-label=\"bookmark\" id=\"social-link--bookmark-above\">Save<\/a>Share this articleCopy LinkEmailFacebookTwitter\/XLinkedInReddit<\/p>\n<p data-test-ui=\"figure__caption\">USA\u2019s Ben Shelton is out of the 2026 ASB Classic at the quarter-final stage. Photo \/ Andrew Cornaga \/ Photosport<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<a class=\"ad__link\" data-test-ui=\"ad__link\" href=\"https:\/\/nzme.co.nz\/advertise\/\" data-ad-env=\"both\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Advertise with NZME.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"\">Top seed Ben Shelton is out of the ASB Classic.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\">\n         The American has fallen at the quarter-final stage, beaten in straight sets by Sebastian Baez (Argentina) on Friday. World No 39 Baez, who is the seventh seed here, is on a hot run after winning all three United Cup matches<br \/>\n         to start the week. But it was a strangely off-colour display by world No 8 Shelton, who struggled to build any momentum in the 7-5, 6-3 loss.\n        <\/p>\n<p class=\"ycPbyrajIUrF\" style=\"display:none\">It\u2019s Shelton\u2019s first defeat (from 13 matches) against Argentine players and just the third time in 21 attempts that Baez has beaten someone ranked inside the top 10.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ycPbyrajIUrF\" style=\"display:none\">Rain halted the match on Thursday night, with Baez ahead 7-5, 0-1. The contest continued in bright sunshine on Friday, with the players walking on to court at 12.15pm. But the signs were not good from the start, as Shelton was broken in his first service game after a loose backhand.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ycPbyrajIUrF\" style=\"display:none\">Baez seemed to have an answer for everything, at one stage running down a drop shot from the opposite corner of the court. Shelton was trying to bring his full armoury, with some wicked serves and big shots, but was erratic and plagued by constant errors.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael Burgess Senior Sports Journalist\u00b7NZ Herald\u00b7 16 Jan, 2026 01:08 AM2 mins to read Subscribe to listenAccess to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235755,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[25286,51,139398,15361,4915,78,111,139,69,139400,62863,8258,139399,213,9423,3010],"class_list":["post-235754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-asb","tag-auckland","tag-baez","tag-ben","tag-classic","tag-in","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-quarterfinals","tag-sebastian","tag-seed","tag-shelton","tag-sports","tag-stuns","tag-top"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235754"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235754\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}