Djokovic out at Federer’s hometown Basel event, stays one back of Swiss icon’s career title total

Novak Djokovic won’t be matching Roger Federer’s 103 career titles at the Swiss icon’s hometown tournament this week.

Djokovic had a tough loss Thursday at the Swiss Indoors, going down 6-7 (4), 7-5, 7-6 (5) to 47th-ranked Jan-Lennard Struff.

Top-seeded Ben Shelton won’t be winning his eighth career title in Basel. He lost to 222nd-ranked Swiss wild card Jerome Kym 6-3, 6-7 (4), 7-6 (1) in a shocking night session.

Djokovic lost when his 36-year-old German opponent clinched with his third match point, his 27th ace fired down the middle that the 39-year-old Serb could not reach. Djokovic had saved the second match point with an ace of his own.

The record 24-time Grand Slam singles champion won his 102nd tour event this month in Beijing. Only Jimmy Connors with 109 career titles has more than Federer’s 103.

Djokovic came to Basel for the first time in 15 years and where he won one of his 102 titles, against Federer in the 2009 final. The next year, Federer won their rematch in Basel where he grew up, was once a ballboy and lifted the trophy a record 10 times.

Shelton loses again to a low-ranked opponent

U.S. Open finalist Shelton now has a hat trick of losses this season to opponents with rankings in triple digits.

Kym’s 222 rank follows No. 140 Otto Virtanen at Wimbledon and No. 117 Nikoloz Basilashvili in Rome.

Shelton also lost this season to seven more opponents ranked between 87 and 56, while winning four titles on three different surfaces.

The No. 4-ranked American twice salvaged precarious positions Thursday, when two points from defeat serving at 5-6 in the second set and trailing by two breaks at 5-2 down in the decider after midnight.

The 23-year-old Kym, a tall right-hander who typically only plays in main draws in his home country Switzerland, raised his game in the final tiebreaker. He clinched with an impressive backhand passing shot played at full stretch running toward the net.

Kym next faces Jiri Lehecka on Friday after the eighth- seeded Czech won 7-5, 6-4 on Daniel Altmaier.

Fils advances to play Fritz in quarter-finals

Earlier, second-seeded Arthur Fils dropped the first set in a tight 4-6, 6-3, 7-6 (5) win over No. 34 Alex Michelsen of the United States.

In the quarter-finals Fils will face another American, sixth-seeded Taylor Fritz, who eased to a 6-4, 6-3 win over Canadian Denis Shapovalov.