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Self-confident show talent: Carlos Alcaraz
Photo:
Matthias Oesterle / IMAGO / ZUMA Wire
Comparing Carlos Alcaraz to the big three in tennis should actually be banned.
Unless one of the elite threesome addresses the parallels themselves.
“When you're young and already very good, the process is quicker than for normal people.
So he's not a normal guy, just like Novak
(Djokovi
ć
, ed.)
wasn't a normal guy, just like Roger
(Federer)
wasn't a normal guy, just like I probably wasn't a normal guy."
This quote about Alcaraz comes from Rafael Nadal.
It's only a few weeks old.
After his surprising three-set defeat against the 16-year-old promoter of the year at the Masters in Madrid, the 21-time Grand Slam champion praised Alcaraz.
The most successful clay-court player in tennis history arguably felt the time had come to pay tribute to his possible successor.
In his speech, Nadal did not dissect the game of the 19-year-old, but he did describe the extraordinary charisma, the great self-confidence and the enormous desire to compete, this teenager, who has developed into a serious competitor on the tour and who also with the French Open in Paris, the Grand Slam event that Nadal has won 13 times and that started on Sunday, could be very dangerous.
Alcaraz' rise to the top of the tennis world has something elemental about it.
That also has something to do with his tournament victory in Madrid.
There, the talent not only won against his childhood idol Nadal, but also in the semifinals against world number one Djokovic.
Beating two of the big three in a row in a tournament was something no player had ever managed to do before.
Against both together he managed 88 so-called winners.
The record is all the more astonishing since only eight of these directly scored points came from aces.
Topspin serve and seamless stops
The Spaniard, whom they call »Carlitos«, little Carlos, in his home country of Murcia, has hardly any weaknesses in his exciting and varied game.
He plays extremely risky and has an exceptional feel for the ball, which is always particularly evident when he scatters startless drop shots.
After his defeat, Djokovic said of his second major weapon, the topspin serve, that he had never seen a ball bounce so high.
Alcaraz wins his matches very rationally and without drama.
“Clinical” is how tennis players like to describe this style.
What also distinguishes the Spaniard from other contenders for Grand Slam titles: In contrast to the so-called "fast giants" Medvedev, Berrettini, Tsitsipas or Alexander Zverev, whom Alcaraz outclassed in the final in Madrid, he is 1.85 meters tall smaller and therefore more manoeuvrable.
Alcaraz moves smoothly and has now also discovered the defensive game that leads him to the lines and into the corners.
His first coach, Carlos Santos, once compared him to Tarzan: "Because he feels as at home on the pitch as Tarzan does in the jungle."
The way to the top of the world was in a way mapped out for Alcaraz.
He already achieved good results in 2021, reaching the quarterfinals at the US Open, for example, which he had to abandon with adductor problems.
Four tournament victories this year, including at major events such as the Miami Open, serve as further evidence of the rapid development of a professional who is still at the beginning of his career.
The right-hander has now climbed to sixth place in the world rankings.
Huge jumps in the ranking preceded this.
Ferrero and Alcaraz – a special relationship
Alcaraz has been training at Juan Carlos Ferrero's academy in Villena, just over an hour from Murcia, for several years.
After ending a brief collaboration with Zverev in 2018, he became Alcaraz' personal trainer.
The former world number one and Roland Garros champion was as versatile as Alcaraz is today compared to the classic Spanish clay court players of his generation.
Because they started out together in the anonymity of lower-class tournaments, Ferrero's relationship with his student went beyond the professional.
Ferrero - who despaired of Zverev's lack of discipline - took on a comprehensive mentoring role in a ten-strong support team.
»Carlos and I as his coach are lucky that his family is A+.
They let me work from the first minute without interfering – even though my tennis player father could tell me a lot,” Ferrero recently told Cadena Ser radio.
Away from the court, Alcaraz hones his strategic skills at chess, spends hours watching old tennis matches on YouTube and usually takes a siesta before his matches.
The Real Madrid fan copied some of the jubilant gestures from soccer superstar Cristiano Ronaldo;
both lack neither sense of mission nor show talent.
"Carlitos" has already arrived so far in the hearts of the Spaniards that its Madrid final with a rating of 25 percent was the top television event of this second Sunday in May and media such as the sports newspaper "Marca" warned that despite all the hype about Alcaraz, one shouldn't forget certain Rafael Nadal.
However, that will not happen because from Sunday onwards at the second major tournament of the year in the Stade Roland Garros in Paris Nadal will be the focus again.
Because the 35-year-old record winner will always be a dazzling favorite as long as he plays on »Terre Battue«.
That can only be right for Alcaraz.
On the other hand, after his furious rise in recent months, he will not be able to compete in the French Open in the shadow of Djokovic or Nadal.
After his rapid rise, he is now also a favorite in the tournament, his clear 6: 4, 6: 2, 6: 0 first round win against the Argentinian Juan Ignacio Londero fitted into the picture.
Rafael Nadal predicted it: This high speed in the development process is what distinguishes the extraordinary from the good.