Experience beats ambition in RG Semis.

Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz owns his ATP Head2Head lead Against Serbian Novak Djokovic back to last year in Madrid SF, but today it is a quite promising battle for a Grand Slam Final spot.

Choosing himself to be the aggressive one on-court, using lots of dropshots, backhands down-the-line, going many times into the net, trying to cut off all the rallies, Djokovic was largely untouchable with such a masterclass Semi-final showdown on Chatrier today.

The 20-year-old had a slow start, letting Djokovic break to just get 3 games up in the first set.
Reaching 4 games to 1 down, The Spaniard starts to mumble with his coach, showing some on-court instability, struggle and frustration.
With a quite high number of unforced errors (16) along the first set, and a low rate of successful first serve points (57%), Alcaraz was a bit suffering to get into the rhythm.

4 games to 2 down, the #1 seed showed some consistency but it ended up in 5 games to 2 for Novak, and it took almost an hour in such hard weather conditions, Novak took the advantage and clinched the first set by 6-3.

When it was up to the Spaniard to go further into the match through the second set, it went up with physical issues, fatigue, cramps, as he ran about 20 meters per point, just before feeling that exhaustion that led him after to just go by only 11 meters in each point.

Despite physical limits at the beginning of the third set, Alcaraz chose to go on until the last hit.

“I would feel sorry for myself if I retire in a semifinal of a grand slam.” Said Alcaraz in the press conference.

Even though it was pretty expected to go on a five-setter match, it was quite obvious that at these late stages of a major, things could turn over bad signs in terms of effort management and tactics.

“He’s a very complete player and he possesses so many qualities. I’m sure that he’s gonna win Roland Garros multiple times in the future. Probably, it wasn’t the best way to end the match for him but Respect for hanging in there until the last point of the match” Djokovic added in the presser.” Djokovic added in the presser.

Going with the 20th straight Grand Slam wins, Djokovic released a rock solid performance, securing his place and going through his 34th Grand Slam Final and his 7th in Roland Garros.
Novak will bid to become the first man to win a 23rd Grand Slam singles title against Norway’s Casper Ruud in tomorrow's final.
He would also return to the world No.1 spot if he lifts the ‘Coupe des Mousquetaires’ in two days' time.
Definitely, this is a must-watch showdown for anybody in a full-house.

By Thabet KRIR