2023-08-11 01:56:00
World No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz nearly saw his run at the National Bank Open in Toronto come to an end, but recovered just in time to win 3-6, 7-6, 7-6 over Hubert Hurkacz, THURSDAY.
The 20-year-old Spaniard was broken from the start in the first two sets. In the first run, he just wasn’t able to catch up. In the second period, however, he prevented Hurkacz from confirming the break, then, several plays later, won the tiebreaker.
In the final set, the heir to Rafael Nadal smashed his vis-à-vis twice to quickly take a 5-2 lead. break, before breaking Alcaraz once more to make it 5-5.
Unfortunately for the 26-year-old athlete, the new star of world tennis completed the loop in 2 hours and 41 minutes.
Note the effectiveness of the Pole in the match, who converted four of the five break points presented to him, once morest three in ten for the first racket in the world.
The young prodigy was playing a second match in 24 hours following defeating American Ben Shelton the day before. This duel also represented the first match for Alcaraz since its consecration at Wimbledon.
For his part, the Pole Hubert Hurkacz is not able to repeat his exploits of last year in Montreal, he who lost in the final of the OBN once morest Pablo Carreno Busta.
Alcaraz has an appointment with Tommy Paul for a place in the semi-finals.
It’s over for Ruud
After the hasty eliminations of Tsitsipas, Rune and Rublev the day before, the Norwegian Casper Ruud must also pack up in Toronto. The fifth player in the world lost in three sets of 7-6, 4-6 and 7-6 once morest the Spaniard Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in a frenzied duel of just over three hours.
Both players held serve for the entire first set, before the first five points of the tiebreaker went once morest the serving player. Fokina was the first to recover and won 7-4.
Ruud looked better in the second set. He was incisive, and broke his vis-à-vis at 4-4 before finishing the job.
In the ultimate set, the third seed smashed the Spaniard early on and then, several plays later, was able to serve for the match. However, Alexander Zverev’s striker didn’t let go and broke the Norwegian to tie the game. In the tiebreaker, the third match point was good for the 37th player in the ATP rankings and the latter reached the quarter-finals.
Fokina will face American Mackenzie McDonald, who knocked out Milos Raonic on Thursday.
There have been many surprises since the start of the week in Toronto where six of the top ten seeds have already disappeared: Stefanos Tsitsipas, Andrey Rublev, Holger Rune, Frances Tiafoe, Félix Auger-Aliassime and Ruud.
Monfils continues on its way
Always appreciated by Canadian fans, the French Gaël Monfils took another step towards a first consecration to the OBN with a victory of 6-4, 6-4 once morest Aleksandar Vukic.
Monfils was particularly effective on serve, hitting nine aces in addition to winning 87% of the points where his first serve was in play. His opponent was unable to convert the two thin break points offered to him by the Frenchman, and the turn was played in 1 hour and 20 minutes.
The husband of Elina Svitolina will certainly make a considerable leap in the next ATP ranking, he who is currently ranked 276th in the world.
En route to the quarter-finals, Monfils also had the upper hand over Stefanos Tsitsipas (no 4) and Christopher Eubanks. He will face Jannik Sinner in the next round, by virtue of Andy Murray’s retirement.
In other matches
The Russian Daniil Medvedev (no 2) is still in the race following his easy victory over the Italian Lorenzo Musetti, 19th in the world, in two sets 6-4, 6-4.
Medvedev will cross swords with Alex De Minaur (18th racket of the ATP) in the next round, since the latter had the upper hand in three sets 7-6, 4-6 and 6-1 once morest the American Taylor Fritz, ninth world player.
In a purely American duel, Tommy Paul sent his sidekick Marcos Giron home in two sets of 6-3, 6-2.
Quarter-finals
C. Alcaraz, ESP (1) c. T. Paul (12), IS.-U.
G. Monfils, FRA c. J. Sinner (7), ITA
M. McDonald, IS.-U. w. A. Davidovich Fokina, ESP
A. De Minaur, AUS v. D. Medvedev (2), RUS
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