Carlos Alcaraz dumped out of Australian Open by Alexander Zverev in another late night show in Melbourne

He had been on a run of reaching at least the semi-finals of a Grand Slam in his last four major entries.

There was a chance for Alcaraz to get revenge on Novak Djokovic from his loss at the ATP Finals at the end of last year with both players on track to reach another major final.

But Alcaraz's run has now ended emphatically with Zverev dominating the Spaniard to progress to the final four.

Zverev, who has only ever reached the semi-final of the Australian Open once previously, has come through some difficult matches in the tournament.

He was nearly knocked out in the second round by Lukas Klein, only to come through a challenging championship tiebreak.

It was a similar story against British No 1 Cam Norrie in the fourth round with Zverev once again coming out on top.

Alcaraz was expected to provide Zverev with an even tougher test as he had breezed through his previous rounds.

But the two-time Grand Slam champion was wiped out in a masterful first set from Zverev to stun the Rod Laver Arena.

A similar pattern followed in the second with Zverev playing at the top of his game, winning 79 per cent of points on his first serve.

That put Zverev in the driver's seat as Alcaraz had never come back from two sets down in his young career.

The 26-year-old then got the all-important break in the fourth game to put him on the verge of a straight sets victory.

But Alcaraz sensationally broke back at the final opportunity when Zverev was serving for the match to light up the Rod Laver Arena.

The world No 6 was unable to truly recover from that with all the momentum on Alcaraz's side, who wrapped up the set's tiebreak to force a fourth.

The fourth set saw both players pushing each other to their limits, each winner being cheered by the thousands still inside Rod Laver Arena into the early hours of the morning.

Nothing separated the pair until the ninth game when Zverev found an extra gear to formulate two break point opportunities.

He only needed one with Alcaraz unable to return with a half-court volley to Zverev's strong backhand.

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The Spaniard brought it back to 30-30, but Zverev's strong service game got him through in the end.

Zverev let out a roar when Alcaraz's return landed out to end the match at just gone 1:20am local time.

It's the first time Zverev has beaten a top-five seed at a Grand Slam in his career and now moves on to face Daniil Medvedev in the semi-finals.