The Roland Garros semifinal that Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz will play this Friday will be much more than a tennis match. It will be a kind of dramatization of the times with airs of change and revolution that are lived in the male circuit. On one side of the net, there will be the magic of a Golden Age, of a Big 3 who refuses to hand over the post, represented in Paris by a Serbian who wants to enlarge his legend. On the other, the talent and freshness of a Next Gen with an enormous future – and already a great present – personified in the figure of a Spaniard hungry for glory. All framed in a duel that could also define a change at the top of the ranking and, for many, leave in check definitively the hegemony of more than two decades of the "old guard".
Condiments more than attractive for the match that will be played at the Philipp Chatrier stadium, not before 9.45 in our country, and that will be the highlight of a day that will close with the clash between the Norwegian Casper Ruud and the German Alexander Zverev, for the other ticket to the decisive instance.
Nole and Carlitos' will be a collision of titans between experience and youth.
The 36-year-old Serbian arrived in Paris with a clear objective: to lift his 23rd Grand Slam and break the parity he shares with Rafael Nadal (absent in Paris for the first time since 2005) to remain as the greatest winner of Majors in history. The search for such iconic brands, he said on more than one occasion, is one of the biggest motivations at this point in his career. And the young Murcian is one of the last "obstacles" he needs to overcome to meet that goal.
Alcaraz wanted to get into the final of a Grand Slam for the second time. Photo Emmanuel DUNAND / AFP
Alcaraz, 20, is on the hunt for his second "major", after the one he conquered at the US Open last year and which allowed him to become the youngest number one in history. But first he wants to get into his second final (the one in New York is the only one he played so far). The Balkan? He already has 33 in his palmares.
If he beats Djokovic, champion in the French capital in 2016 and 2021 (and finalist four other times), the Spaniard will also secure his position as leader of the ranking. Otherwise, it will give the Serb the chance to steal the first place, for which Nole will need to shout champion later.
This will be just chapter two of the history between the two. The only precedent is the semifinal of the Masters 1000 in Madrid last year. Alcaraz, with just turned 19 and in the ninth step of the classification, beat Djokovic in three and a half hours, then he was number one, in a match he was later chosen as the best of the year by the ATP. It was 6-7 (5-7), 7-5 and 7-6 (7-5). The Murcia, who had fallen in the quarters to Nadal, won days later to Zverev and stayed with the crown.
"Since last year I've really wanted to play against Novak again. We're both at a great level and I'm looking forward to that match. I'm going to enjoy it," said the Spaniard, after passing Stefanos Tsitsipas in the quarters – 6-2, 6-1 and 7-6 (7-5) with superb tennis – and signing what is already his best historical performance in the "great" French.
Against the Greek, fifth seed, Carlitos played "one of the best matches" of his life and then said: "I feel like one of the best in the world and I think I'm showing it. I have enormous confidence in all aspects of the game and I feel great both physically and mentally and tennis."
Still, pressure was taken out and anticipated: "Novak is one of the best in history. He has 45 Grand Slam semi-finals played and all that experience makes him a favorite in any tournament in which he competes, because he is a true legend. I don't think for a moment about whether he will hold my pace, but rather the other way around; if I can withstand the level of demand that marks".
"This is the match that a lot of people want to see," Djokovic said after beating Karen Khachanov 4-6, 7-6 (7-0), 6-2, 6-4, which made him sweat in the first two sets - "The worst I played so far," he said - and stole the only partial he gave up so far.
"It will definitely be the biggest challenge for me so far in the tournament. If you want to be the best, you have to beat the best. And without a doubt, Alcaraz is "the player" to defeat here. I'm looking forward to it," the Serbian added.
"He's a great guy, very nice on and off the court. He brings a lot of intensity in the matches. He reminds me of someone from his country who plays with his left hand...", he said with a smile, remembering Nadal, the greatest rival of his career and one of his teammates of that unforgettable Big 3, along with Roger Federer. "Carlitos works hard and is a very complete player at only 20 years old. He deserves his successes."
Who arrives at the best time? Undoubtedly, Alcaraz. The Spaniard shouted champion in Barcelona and Madrid in his preparation for Roland Garros, where he arrived with a record of 20 wins and two losses in the year on brick dust. Djokovic only played three tournaments, without great results: he lost in the second round of Monte Carlo, in the quarters of Banja Luka and in that same instance in Rome. And he added five celebrations and three falls on slow courts before landing in Paris, where, despite his firm walk, he did not dazzle or waste as much security as his rival on Friday.
Djokovic is going for the seventh final at Roland Garros. Photo (AP Photo/Jean-Francois Badias
The Serbian, however, got tired of demonstrating in the past that he has a natural ability to get his best version in the important moments and "to find solutions to all kinds of problems where others do not and turn around the most impossible situations", as analyzed by Juan Carlos Ferrero, coach of Alcaraz.
Therefore, it will not be an easy adversary to bend for the Spaniard. And vice versa.
"One (Djokovic) has experience. The other (Alcaraz) has legs and moves like Speedy Gonzalez. Carlitos can hit huge punches and hit very hard. Novak, control and have precision like no one else to exert pressure and just make the opponent move as much as possible. I don't know how to pick a favourite," Tsitsipas reflected, after the Spaniard beat him.
Alcaraz-Djokovic. The duel that everyone wanted to see at Roland Garros. A semis with early finish flavor and too many extra seasonings. A clash that could define the fight for numbers and that will face the (perhaps) last gladiator of a Golden Age, which seems closer and closer to ending, with the leader of a new generation of bright future, which has already begun to write its own history. An unmissable match, wherever you look at it.
Ruud-Zverev, the forgotten semifinal
The expectation for the clash between Alcaraz and Djokovic made many forget that this Friday will be played, in addition, the other semis of the 2023 edition of Roland Garros. Not before 12.30 in Argentina, Casper Ruud and Alexander Zverev will face each other in a match that will decide the second classified to the final and that also promises to be a nice show.
The 24-year-old Norwegian, world number four, wants to get into the defining instance of a Grand Slam for the third time. Last year, he fell in the last match in Paris against Nadal and months later lost in the US Open to Alcaraz. After a difficult start to 2023, he regained his game and his confidence in the tour of brick dust (he won Estoril and reached the semis in Rome) and was advancing steadily in the "big" Frenchman.
In the quarters, he dropped the Danish Holger Rune, sixth in the ranking and who had eliminated him at the Foro Italico, with a solid victory 6-1, 6-2, 3-6 and 6-3. "I'm very happy. Maybe it was my biggest win of the year, considering how the season has gone for me," he said.
Zverev, 26 years old and 27th in the ranking, is going for his second final in a Major (he lost the Flushing Meadows 2020 with Dominic Thiem) and the first in Paris, where last year he lived a very hard moment. Because he left in a wheelchair and crying from his semis duel against Nadal after suffering the rupture of several ligaments in his right ankle, an injury that kept him away from the courts throughout the second half of 2022.
Recovered, a year later the German is again among the four best in this contest, after ending in the quarters the dream of Tomás Etcheverry, whom he defeated 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 and 6-4. But he wants more. "Last year was the hardest of my life. It's amazing to be in the semi-final of a Grand Slam again. I'm happy, but hopefully I have two more games left," he reflected.
It will be the first duel between the two in a Grand Slam. The head-to-head marks a clear superiority for Zverev, who took three of the four games they played in the past (he lost only the last one, in the quarterfinals of Miami 2022). But all the previous clashes were on slow courts and this will be the first in brick dust, the Norwegian's favorite surface.
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