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Carlos Alcaraz warned Novak Djokovic he is coming for his records after comfortably beating the Serbian to retain the Wimbledon title.
After a five-set classic between the pair 12 months ago that saw Djokovic dethroned as the king of Centre Court, here it was all over in just two hours and 27 minutes as Alcaraz overcame a late wobble to claim a 6-2 6-2 7-6 (4) victory.
The 21-year-old Spaniard becomes just the second man in the open era after Roger Federer to win his first four grand slam finals, while he has outdone the great Swiss, Djokovic and Rafael Nadal by reaching that landmark before his 22nd birthday.
He is also the youngest man to win the French Open and Wimbledon back-to-back, and Alcaraz said: “Obviously it’s a really great start of my career but I have to keep going, I have to keep building my path.
“At the end of my career, I want to sit at the same table as the big guys. That’s my main goal. That’s my dream right now. It doesn’t matter if I already won four grand slams at the age of 21. If I don’t keep going, all these tournaments for me, it doesn’t matter.
“I don’t know what is my limit. I don’t want to think about it. I just want to keep enjoying my moment, just to keep dreaming. So let’s see if at the end of my career it’s going to be 25, 30, 15, four.”
With Jannik Sinner having won the Australian Open and Alcaraz going back-to-back at Roland Garros and here, it finally appears that men’s tennis belongs to the new generation.
Djokovic, meanwhile, is still agonisingly short of an all-time record 25th slam singles title, and remains one behind Federer’s tally of eight Wimbledon crowns.
From the moment Alcaraz broke serve in a 13-minute first game featuring seven deuces and five break points, the young Spaniard was in control.
The two men were playing at different speeds, Alcaraz whipping forehands past his opponent, applying constant pressure to the Djokovic serve and sending his own down at speeds up to 136 miles per hour.
The age and experience gap, which Djokovic has used in his favour so many times, now appeared a hindrance, although it cannot be forgotten that the 37-year-old had knee surgery just over a month ago and had performed near miracles just to make it to the All England Club.
He finally came to life in the third set, hanging with Alcaraz until the Spaniard played a superb game to break for 5-4.
Moments later he was up 40-0 with three match points but he froze dramatically at the finish line, serving a double fault and making a succession of errors, one after an ill-timed scream from a woman in the crowd, to allow Djokovic to break back.
Alcaraz steadied himself, though, and completed the job in the tie-break to successfully defend a slam crown for the first time.
“I feel it was the first one,” he said after receiving the trophy from the Princess of Wales. “It is an amazing feeling for me being the champion here in Wimbledon back-to-back. I’m really proud and really happy about it.
“Obviously Novak didn’t play his best the first two sets, a lot of mistakes. I made the most of that. It is a great feeling even thinking about being French Open winner and Wimbledon champion the same year, that few players have done it before. It’s unbelievable.”
It has been a tough season for Djokovic, with this his first final of 2024. He had taken advantage of a kind draw to make it to the showpiece but Alcaraz proved a step up that was beyond him.
“I was inferior on the court,” he said. “That’s it. He was a better player. He played every single shot better than I did.
“I did all I can to prepare myself for this match and this tournament in general. If someone told me I would play Wimbledon finals three, four weeks ago, I would take it for sure.
“Of course, I do feel disappointed. It’s a bitter taste to lose the finals the way I did today. I can always be self-critical, which I am. I can always find the flaws, which I can already see.
“I don’t think that would change too much the course of the match, to be honest. From the very beginning, you could see he was at least half a step better than I am in every way.
“I also feel like, in a match-up today against the best player right now in the world for sure, other than Jannik, and both of them are the best this year by far, I’m not at that level.”
