The difference between a good player and a super class is that the latter always wins when it has to and takes advantage if the matches are prolonged no matter how difficult they may be.
Carlos Alcaraz He did it again this Friday in the third round of Wimbledon. For the twelfth time in his career he has decided in his favor a duel to the limit of five sets. His victim was a combative Frances Tiafoe, 5-7, 6-2, 4-6, 7-6(2) and 6-2, in three hours and 49 minutes. The show ended with a drop.
The rain was once again the protagonist on the fifth day. Of the three games played by Alcaraz, two have been indoors. He only saw the sun on the day of his debut against Mark Lajal. And the weather forecast is scary for the next few days, with the handicap that the leaders of the All England Club only put three games in the two stadiums with retractable roofs to preserve the green.
Alcaraz has already chained 10 victories on the grass of the third largest. Qualifies for the third time for the round of 16 of the British tournament. In the Open Era (1968) only six other Spaniards had repeated up to three times in that round: Rafael Nadal (10), Feliciano López (6), David Ferrer (5), Fernando Verdasco (5), Juan Carlos Ferrero (4) and Roberto Bautista (4).
The El Palmar tennis player is already a regular in the second week of the ‘majors’. He has already reached the round of 16 on 10 occasions at just 21 years old. He joins a club where until today there were only 10 members of the ‘Armada’.
In the memory it was the exciting semifinal that measured Alcaraz and Tiafoe at the 2022 US Open. Things have changed a lot for the two protagonists. Carlitos has not stopped growing and Tiafoe has stagnated and is now 26 years old, although he is put in the same bandwagon as the new generation of Yankee tennis players along with Ben Shelton, Christopher Eubanks and Brandon Nakashima. In fact, he has fallen to twenty-ninth place in the ranking and his record includes three minor tournaments such as those in Delray Beach (2018) and Houston and Stuttgart (2023).
Precisely in this last tournament, Frances demonstrated her good manners on grass. The American’s preparatory tour has been limited to Queen’s, where she had to withdraw from the debut with Rinky Hijikata due to her hip after suffering a slip.
At Wimbledon he wears a black knee pad, but since he is not Novak Djokovic, no one has noticed it. She has received, like the Serbian, permission from the tournament management because the rule indicates that she has to be white.
Tiafoe was the first to make a break option in the fifth game. The Spaniard saved her with a missile at 210 kilometers per hour. The American has a short movement when hitting the ball that helps him on the green carpet of the British capital. He allows himself the luxury of making incredible drops.
The pupil of Juan Carlos Ferrero he took the game to his field, that of the long exchanges that can now be allowed because there is land in the funds. He chose the sixth round to add the first break and try to give the final blow to the score and the match. He didn’t make it because he lost his serve immediately afterward. From 4-2 it went to 4-4. It was time to start from scratch.
An electric rival
Frances was plugged in and encouraged the public to take his side. Alcaraz had lost precision with his right.
Two serves at 212 kilometers per hour saved two of the three breaking balls against in the ninth game. She lost her serve again in the eleventh set. Goodbye to the set, the first one that was lost in this edition of the tournament.
It was time to come back and the Spaniard continued to give back everything he could. Carlitos smelled blood and went after the prey. He shot the result up to a favorable 6-2. He would later sign the tables.
The young man from Murcia showed his class by crossing the net to pick up his opponent when he had slipped. He also applauded him every time he hit a spectacular winning shot.
The tie was maintained in the third set until the American returned to the fray with his third break.. With two rounds to one against, the statistic came out that invited Carlitos to be optimistic: Of his 12 five-set matches he had decided 11 in his favor. Two of them were very recent in time because They were in the semifinals and final of Roland Garros.
Alcaraz put on his overalls, his victim was already in pain, and he did it again, as if it were just another day at the office. That’s why he is the chosen one.
Umberto Nakashima
The champion of three majors will have to wait to find out the name of his rival on Sunday for a place in the quarterfinals. And Ugo Humbert and Brandon Nakashimascheduled for the first shift on runway 12, remain unfinished due to the incessant rain.
