Carlos Alcaraz broke out a year ago as the sensation of world tennis on this stage, on Arthur Ashe, the center court of the US Open. He knocked down Stefanos Tsitsipas, third favorite of the tournament, in an unforgettable match, and put himself on everyone’s lips: Is this the future of tennis?
The Murcian has responded: I am not a shooting star. This Friday, on that same New York blue court where his soles squeak violently, in his first appearance in a major semifinal, he got a non-stop ticket to the top of world tennis. He beat Frances Tiafoe with a lot of effort (6-7, 6-3, 6-1, 6-7, 6-3) and this Sunday will opt for his first ‘great’ and number one in the world.
To achieve this, you will have to prevail over Casper Ruud, another tennis player who has stood out this season. The Norwegian won his semi-final against Russian Karen Kachanov and is in the same situation as Alcaraz: He opts to win his first ‘big’ (he reached the Roland Garros final) and, if he succeeds, he will also win the number one prize.
Tiafoe’s was an exciting and long duel, something with which Alcaraz is spoiling the New York public. It is not that the tickets are cheap, but New Yorkers should pay a little more to see the Murcian, with whom there is plenty of show in each appearance. Or maybe ask for a discount for the cardiologist.
In the case of the match with Tiafoe, the epic tasted worse. Because Alcaraz saw himself with the match downhill, comfortable, with abundant break points and with a match point that would have saved a lot of suffering. But he was clouded to the point of endangering the final.
missed opportunities
Tiafoe arrived packed to the semifinal. He had only lost one set in the tournament, the only one that Rafael Nadal managed to win in the previous match, the round of 16. But in front of him was a tennis player with the mental drive of having overcome the last two rounds with five-set marathon matches, until late at night. In the quarterfinals, against the Italian Jannik Sinner, coming back from a match point.
“I’m a bull!” Carlos Alcaraz shouted the other night to his box, in the round of 16, at the climax of his five-and-fourth Sinner match. But this Friday, it was he, and not Tiafoe, who took a cartwheel first. He lost the first set on details and the match was complicated.
The American appeared with the same energy that he has displayed throughout the tournament. At the US Open of Serena Williams’ withdrawal, Tiafoe was confirmed as the face of tennis in the US black communitywhere it has a very minority representation.
He was the first black American in the New York semifinals since 1972, with Arthur Ashe, the pioneer after whom the center is named. And within a bleak American panorama in male paintings for decades, without figures like Andy Roddick or, much less, Pete Sampras.
“Come on Tiafoe!” Michelle Obama was seen shouting as soon as the camera was pointed at her, and she received a standing ovation from the respectable. The former first lady of the United States was in the background, in the second row, and she made it clear who she was with. She just applauded the American’s points.
And that Alcaraz gave him plenty of reasons. The first round did not have an outstanding tennis, but it did have exchanges of those with which the news is filled. One was so spectacular that Tiafoe jumped the net and made a gesture with his hand ‘go that way!’, with a smile on his face, also in Alcaraz’s and in that of the almost 24,000 people who filled the stadium .
It cost Alcaraz find the rhythm in that first set. He tried to be aggressive to the rest, but he couldn’t open holes. He missed ‘break’ opportunities, which he ended up paying for.
That took the set to a tie break, a territory in which Tiafoe has excelled this year in New York. Of the six sudden deaths he’d contested as of Friday, he hadn’t let one slip away. This was no exception, and he took it for details, such as a huge direct serve from the American and a definitive double fault from the Spanish.
A set against Alcaraz. it was time to row, as in the eternal matches against Marin Cilic (eighth) and Sinner. Alcaraz complied. He let go of the right hand and Tiafoe began to have a hard time holding on to the rallies. “On the second serve, when you don’t see it clearly, hit hard and through the center,” his coach, Juan Carlos Ferrero, told him from the corner. And the Spaniard saw it clearly, beyond the rest: he no longer had a hard time taking advantage of his ‘break’ balls and prevailed with ease.
With the match tied at two sets, Alcaraz did not row. He put the outboard motor. He pummeled Tiafoe, disarmed by the intensity of the rally and the Murcian’s lack of errors. The momentum lasted until 2-0 in favor of the Spaniard in the fourth set, it seemed that the duel would die in his favor.
mental strength
The game, however, got tangled up. Alcaraz and Tiafoe chained four service breaks. The American survived in the confusion. The Murcian dominated the games and squeezed the serve from him, but without taking distance. “Brave, brave!” They said to him from the corner, and perhaps he was guilty of being so. When he finally got a match point, in a bossy rally, he dropped a dropshot. Tiafoe, as fast as Alcaraz, arrived and returned another one, even tighter, and lethal. To row again.
Perhaps Alcaraz will be grateful in the long run for what happened next: he ended up losing the set in a new tie break, ending with two right hands outside. a comfortable match turned into a mental nightmare: He had to win back what he had already won, with nearly fourteen hours of tennis on his legs in just five days, aged 19, in his first semi-final appearance.
He overcame the challenge, won the fifth set and his tennis is one notch higher. It will come in handy for the final against Ruud, with more experience in ‘big’ than him and who measures his nerves very well.
“This really hurts,” Tiafoe said on the court at the end of the match, emotional after a game in which he gave himself completely. “I’m going to come back and I’m going to win this one day, I’m sorry,” he lamented before the public.
“In the semifinals you have to give everything, fight until the last ball, it doesn’t matter if you’ve been fighting for five hours or six,” said the Murcian, with a smile on his face. “I will have to control my nerves in my first grand slam final, but of course I am very happy and I will enjoy every moment. We’ll see what happens”.
“What I experienced today is incredible,” he said later in Spanish, after four hours and twenty minutes of battle. “Three five-set matches, very long, very demanding,” he added about their round of 16, quarter and semifinal matches. “The truth is that I have strength thanks to you, you encourage me at every point, every ball,” he dedicated to the public. They are already waiting for him for the grand finale this Sunday. Also cardiologists.
