Apart from the last two editions of Wimbledonwhere he has four wins and two losses, Carlos Alcaraz playing this week to Queen his first ATP tournament on grass, where the codes of the game are more complicated to understand due to the specificity of the surface and several tour championships, all concentrated in just one month towards the peak of Wimbledon (July 3-16).
The Murcian suffered in his debut match Arthur Rinderknecht (4-6, 7-5, 7-6), he got the trick better Jiri Lehecka (6-2, 6-3) and kept the green light in this Friday match Grigor Dimitrov (6-4, 6-4) to reach the grass-court semifinals for the first time. Great champions learn quickly. His quarterfinals stats remain unblemished this season: eight games, eight wins.
Alcaraz, 20 years old and world number 2, will try to climb another step and reach his first final on grass, facing off this Saturday against Sebastian Korda (32nd). the danish Holger Rune (6th) and the Australian Alex De Minaur (18th) will open the semifinals at 1:00 pm and then the Spanish and American turn.
Taking advantage of the break and the small gift from Dimitrov in the opening game, Carlos signed a good first set, made only two unforced errors, and was always determined on important points, like when he raised three break points to maintain his lead. (4- 2) and then sign up for the 6-4 part.
The 32-year-old Bulgarian, ranked 26th, raised his level at the start of the second round with some spectacular shots, breaking Murcia’s serve in the second game and leading 0- 3. All in all, Dimitrov has a tendency to weaken for no apparent reason and, against a competitive beast like Alcaraz, he paid for it heavily: the Murcian linked four consecutive games (4-3) and , although Grigor is still emotional. (4-4), Carlos finished next (6-4).
Alcaraz had already been warned about Korda’s potential, winning one of his three games, last year Monte Carlo. At 22 years old, Sebastian is another young man with a big risk where a wrist injury conditioned his season, which started very well after the first win against Daniel Medvedev and then reach the quarterfinals of australia tomorrowwhere he stopped him Karen Khachanova.
However, injury sidelined him from the circuit until April and he lost three of his four matches on the clay tour, certainly the worst surface for the canons of his powerful game. Alcaraz will see to what extent his reaction to Queen’s can be a turning point for him.
Source: La Verdad
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