What a semi final to remember on clay last night by the young Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz who is now on his way to Sunday’s big Roland Garros Final at Court Phillipe Chatrier after overcoming Australian Open champ Jannik Sinner in a long five-set contest.
Yes, he had a really poor start with Sinner winning the easy first set’s play. However, Alcaraz finally got the ball rolling where he managed to equalise his opponent at 1-1 apiece. Although Sinner never backed down in the hope of getting the job done following his 3rd set rebound, but at the end of the day, Alcaraz is the man that showed the best physical and mental toughness through the very end of that semi-final. The Spaniard rolled out the 5th and final decider following another close equalising set before he eventually found a way to close things out so quickly after a long afternoon on-court.
The final score was 2-6, 6-3, 3-6, 6-4 and 6-3 at Court Phillipe Chatrier.
Alcaraz has unfinished business off the back of his Wimbledon triumph last year despite some disappointments along the way. But he’s stepped up well into the next level at Roland Garros where it will be first big final there in the hope of winning his 3rd grand slam title. He first won the US Open two years ago before Wimbledon last year as 2024 could be the year he wins here and then come January he finally wins at Melbourne Park in 2025 – how about that? For now, he’s never backed down all along to stay in the game as just need to get that ball rolling right from the word go in the first set & he’ll get what he wants.
And Sinner unable to grasp the best out of Alcaraz when he just couldn’t close the game out despite leading a few times. He got straight into it to begin with where the Italian had some good moments to keep in check but then began to slip away once Alcaraz settled in after some time when pressure began to mount on him big time including the 5th set decider before it was too late in the end. It’s gutting to see him fall short after an outstanding last half year as said with the Davis Cup win for Italy & the Australian Open, but this was his first breakthrough (semis) on clay as he will surely look to rebound next time.
Alcaraz’s next opponent for Sunday’s men’s singles final will be joined by Alexander Zverev from Germany who defeated Alex De Minaur the other day during the Quarter-Final. Like the Spaniard, he too have bounced back so fast from the opening set down including a tight 3rd set battle v Norwegian Casper Ruud to book his 2nd major grand slam Final since the 2020 US Open. Having still yet to win a grand slam trophy at 27 following his first time loss to the now retired Dominic Thiem (Austria), can he really break his duck other than winning an Olympic Gold by defying the 21-year-old wonderkid? If not, will see unfinished business by seeing Alcaraz winning another first time major on clay who still has a big future ahead? It all comes down to this come Sunday night (our time) where it’s okay to stay up now going into overnight since the King’s Birthday public holiday (depending on where you live mainly in most states except WA and QLD) takes place the next day on Monday.
