Washington, July 25 : Frances Tiafoe scored a statement 6-1, 6-4 victory against returning finalist Flavio Cobolli to reach the quarterfinal of DC Open. This is Tiafoe's third quarterfinal of the 2025 ATP Tour season after Houston and Roland Garros.

Tiafoe joins Andre Agassi and Alexander Zverev as the only men this century to reach the Washington quarters in four consecutive years. With his first Top 20 win of the season (1-2), Tiafoe has now recorded back-to-back hard-court wins for the first time since his run to the 2024 US Open semi-finals, ATP reports.

Tiafoe beat countryman Ben Shelton in last year's US Open third round and will now have a chance to level the pair's Lexus ATP Head2Head at 2-2 when the home favourites meet again in Friday's quarter-finals. Shelton booked his place in the last eight with a 6-3, 6-2 win against Gabriel Diallo.

"I'm excited. We're great friends. We played an incredible match at the Open last year, I think that's the best we actually both played. He got me the first couple of times. He's a great player, a great friend of mine," Tiafoe said of the matchup with Shelton.

Shelton is into his second quarterfinal in as many events after reaching that stage at Wimbledon, where he lost to eventual champion Jannik Sinner. Seven of Shelton's 19 tour-level quarter-finals have come on home soil, according to ATP Stats.

Elsewhere, American Brandon Nakashima also advanced to the Washington quarters with a 7-6(3), 6-3 win against Cameron Norrie, setting up a meeting with seventh seed Alex de Minaur.

Taylor Fritz registered a 6-3, 6-4 victory against Italy's Matteo Arnaldi. The top seed is through to his fourth quarter-final in his past five events, including his semi-final showing at Wimbledon.

/IANS