The highly anticipated semi-final encounter between Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic ended in bitter anticlimax on Friday afternoon. After two intense, high-quality sets, Djokovic eased past a cramping Alcaraz 6-3, 5-7, 6-1, 6-1 to return to the French Open final.
With little to separate the two best players in the world at one set all, Alcaraz began to struggle with cramp early in the third set. Although he refused to retire, remaining on court until the end, the Spaniard struggled to move and was uncompetitive in the last two sets.
As Djokovic contests his seventh French Open final, he will also compete for a men’s record-breaking 23rd grand slam singles title on Sunday as he looks to become the first man in the Open era to win each grand slam three times. If he wins, he will also recover the No 1 ranking from Alcaraz after losing it during the clay season.
“First and foremost, I have to say tough luck for Carlos,” said Djokovic during his on-court interview. “At this level the last thing you want is cramps and physical problems at the late stages of the grand slams. I feel for him, I feel sorry, I hope he can recover and come back pretty soon. I told him at the net – he knows how young he is, he’s got plenty of time ahead of him and he will win this tournament many times.”
Djokovic had begun with questions still surrounding his form after battling through a poor, injury-ravaged clay swing. Although his performances had improved during his time in Paris, the extent remained unclear. Against the No 1 and most in-form player in the world, the calls for a possible victory for the youngster were deafening.
But as has been the case so often in his career, the lofty occasion and form of his opponent instantly provoked a higher level from Djokovic. Against most players, unleashing his enormous forehand has been enough for Alcaraz to force opponents back, open up the angles and dominate. But against Djokovic, the ball just comes back, constantly, with immaculate depth.
During the opening set, Djokovic’s supreme ability to soak up pace and pressure continually elicited errors from a frustrated Alcaraz and he triumphed in many of the delicate cat-and-mouse rallies around the net. Djokovic broke Alcaraz’s serve at 2-1 and held on to the break to claim the set.
As the match endured, Alcaraz gradually began to settle down in the swirling wind. As the pair engaged in frantic rallies, using every shot in their vast arsenals and covering the entire court, Alcaraz produced perhaps the shot of the tournament. After chasing down a lob and with his back to the net, Alcaraz flicked an angled forehand past Djokovic in the service box.
As Alcaraz improved, it was Djokovic who began to struggle physically. At 3-4 in the second set, he called for the trainer to massage his right elbow. It led to a tension-filled, chaotic end to the set as momentum rapidly swung from one to the other. After saving a break point at 5-5, Alcaraz took the set 7-5 to level the match.
Just as the match came alive, it was all but over. With the score 1-0 to Alcaraz and 40-30 on Djokovic’s serve, the younger man began to cramp badly in his right calf. He eventually called the trainer. Since cramp is deemed a fitness problem rather than an injury, and players are not allowed to receive medical timeouts for cramp, Alcaraz was docked the next point and the subsequent game as he received treatment.
Alcaraz emerged from the timeout down a break at 1-2 and he still could not run, drive with his legs on serve or load weight on his right leg. In a tense and awkward atmosphere, Djokovic quickly rolled through the third set, winning 11 consecutive games. Alcaraz finally managed to hold serve and win a game while trailing 5-0 in the fourth set, but it merely delayed the end to one of the most miserable days of his young career.
It is difficult to think of a recent match, not involving two members of the big three, that has commanded so much hype. An inter-generational encounter between the elder in the final stretch of his career and, at last, after so many false starts, a worthy younger rival. For Alcaraz, who said he had wanted this meeting since the start of the tournament, the stress was too much.
“I started really nervous,” said Alcaraz. “The tension of the first set, the second set, it was really intense two sets, as well. Really good rallies, tough rallies drop shots, sprints, rallies. It’s a combination of a lot of things. But the main thing, it was the tension that I had all the two first sets.”
With 16 years separating Djokovic and Alcaraz, the semi-final also represented the largest age gap between grand slam semi-finalists since Jim Courier defeated Jimmy Connors in the 1991 US Open semi-finals. In these matchups with huge age gaps, the younger player normally has the edge. But none of those previous involved Djokovic. In the end, the 36-year-old physically outlasted the 20-year-old.
