"If someone had said a week ago that I'd be in the Wimbledon final I would have thought, 'you're talking a load of rubbish'," Michael Zheng told itftennis.com. "It's incredible and I definitely wasn't expecting it. I thought maybe I would go a couple of rounds, but this is amazing."

Amazing is a perfect word to describe Zheng's run at The All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC) over the past few weeks, winning five matches en route to his first grand slam final appearance in his very short professional career.

Zheng opened with a 6-3, 6-4 win over Hayden Jones of Australia followed by a second round win over Martin Antonio Vergara Del Puerto of Paraguay, 7-5, 6-0.  In the third round, Zheng would take on fellow American Aidan Kim.  Zheng would lose his first set of the tournament, but rebounded well for a 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 victory over Kim, sending Michael to the boy's singles quarterfinals.

In the quarters, Zheng faced Chak Lam Coleman Wong of Hong Kong, China, defeating the 18 year old in straight sets 6-4, 6-3, earning a spot in the Wimbledon boy's semifinal against #10 Martin Landaluce of Spain.  The semifinal match would be the toughest test for Zheng so far, having to go to a tie-breaker in the third set to crown a winner.  After winning 6-3 in the first set, Zheng dropped the second set 3-6.  Zheng and Landaluce went back and forth in the third set, with Zheng coming out victorious 7-6 (10-7) in the final set tie breaker, sending Michael to his first ever Wimbledon boy's singles final.  "I don't have much experience from other Grand Slams in terms of going deep but it is a great feeling to get to the final, especially after one of the best matches I have played in my career," said Zheng after his semifinal victory.  "I brought my A-game. Martin played really well and it is definitely one of the highest-quality matches in my young career so far. He is still two years younger than me and is going to be unbelievable. The guy is one of the best juniors in the world, for sure."

This set up a matchup with #3 ranked Mili Poljicak of Croatia.  Zheng would open the match with a 5-2 advantage, but could not put the tough Croatian away.  Poljicak fought back to tie the score 5-5, and 6-6 after Zheng retook the lead 6-5. Poljicak would win the first set tiebreaker 6-2, taking a 1-0 lead into the second set.

Zheng once again took an early lead, going up 3-1 in the second set.  Poljicak would rebound once again, taking a 4-3 lead, before Zheng tied the score at 4-4.  Tied once again at 6-6, the second set would go to a tiebreaker.  Falling behind 1-4, Zheng fought back to cut the lead to 3-4, but Poljicak would score three more points, with the matching coming to an end on a forehand forced error by Zheng, dropping another heartbreaking tiebreaker 7-3.

Despite the loss, this was a life changing experience for Michael Zheng and we look forward to watching him compete at the US Open in just over a month!  Congrats on your Wimbledon run and best of luck moving forward!