The Spanish Carlos Alcaraz conquered Roland Garros for the first time in his career, and Rafael Nadal became a legend, by defeating the German Alexander Zverev 6-3, 2-6 in the final this Sunday in five sets and with a comeback included. 5-7, 6-1 and 6-2.
This achievement will allow him to rise in the next ATP ranking to number 2, only exceeded by the Italian Jannik Sinner [new number 1] and overtaking the Serbian Novak Djokovic, champion last year on the clay court in Paris who abandoned this due to injury, once before the quarterfinals.
“As a child, I used to run from school to go watch the matches of this tournament on television. Now I am lifting the trophy here,” Alcaraz was excited at the ceremony in which he received the long-awaited Musketeers Cup.
At 21 years old, Alcaraz already has 3 Grand Slam tournaments since he had previously been crowned on hard court at the United States Open in 2022 and on grass at Wimbledon in 2023.
He is the youngest player to score three majors on different surfaces, evidence of his versatility.
Above all, he managed to register his name in the tournament where Spanish tennis has traditionally achieved its greatest feats: it is the 27th title for a Spanish tennis player in the individual draws at Roland Garros and the 23rd in the men’s category.
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Alcaraz thus joins his name to those of Spanish tennis myths such as Nadal himself (record 14 titles), Arantxa Sánchez Vicario (3), or Manuel Santana (2). But also that of Juan Carlos Ferrero, his coach, who in 2003 was the last Spaniard to win the men’s category at the Philippe Chatrier before the Nadal era.
The season on clay ends for Alcaraz in the best way in spite of the fact that during it he had barely been able to play for an injury to his right forearm, where he wore a special bandage in his seven games towards the title in the French capital.
It was the second Grand Slam final that Zverev reached and the second that has resulted in defeat, after the 2020 United States Open against the Austrian Dominic Thiem.
On a sunny spring afternoon, Alcaraz began the match with solvent and effective tennis, multiplying the drop shots, in the tone of the fifth set that had allowed him to win on Friday in the semifinals against Sinner.
After an exchange of breaks in the first two games, Alcaraz was much more solid with his serve while getting two more breaks of the German’s serve, to take the opening set 6-3.
In the second, Zverev reacted, not letting his serve slip away at any time. Two blows in the form of breaks, first for 3-2 and then 5-2, allowed him to score that set by 6-2 and get some oxygen.
Alcaraz then let the third set slip out of his hands: he led 5-2 but there he saw how Zverev chained five games in a row to win the set 7-5. The Spaniard’s reaction was an attack of rage, signing an unappealable 6-1 in the fourth.
The fifth set are good for Alcaraz and he was faithful to tradition, with two breaks along the way, he closed the duel with 6-2, after 4 hours and 19 minutes of vibrant battle.
It was the second Grand Slam final that Zverev reached and the second that has resulted in defeat, after the 2020 United States Open against the Austrian Dominic Thiem.
Germany still has no men’s titles at Roland Garros in the Open era, where the only ones the country achieved were Steffi Graf’s six, but in the women’s team.
The last German Grand Slam title in the men’s group dates back to the one achieved by Boris Becker at the 1996 Australian Open.
Before the men’s final, the women’s doubles final had been played on the same court, in which the American Coco Gauff and the Czech Katerina Siniakova defeated the Italians Jasmine Paolini and Sara Errani 7-6 (7/5) and 6 -3.
Paolini thus lost his second final in two days. On Saturday she had fallen in the individual draw against the Polish Iga Swiatek.
