From newbie to favorite

In 2021, Carlos Alcaraz made his debut in the main draw at Roland Garros. He had been in the top-100 for just a week and had to win the position in the previous one, after having fallen in it the previous year at the first exchange, against the Australian Vukic. In 2022 he is one of the big favorites to win the Musketeers Cup. A string of precocious records, 29 victories, with this Sunday against the Argentine Juan Ignacio Londero (6-4, 6-2 and 6-0 in 1h51)and four titles so far this year, endorse to the 19-year-old from Murcia, who will face his compatriot Albert Ramos on Wednesday, curiously, the first rival he won in his ATP debut.

In the initial set, somewhat bland, like the gray sky that was seen over a Philippe Chatrier who recorded a little more than half an inning, Carlos did just enough to get ahead. He took advantage of his first break ball in the tenth game, like a top. Londero was weighed down by the pressure of solving a decisive moment, as happens to many when they face the giants Nadal, Federer and Djokovic. The boy has reached that level of hierarchy in a couple of campaigns. The public was amazed by the acceleration that he prints on the ball with his drive and with his serve. The first was so strong that after the bounce, the ball hit an elderly spectator at one of the ends of the imposing central court, renovated in 2019. He had never played there. “Today I have realized that it is not easy, you have to adapt to the distances and the rhythm, but during the match there is time to do it”, he acknowledged. As the phrase of the Roland Garros aviator reproduced on one of the sides of the stadium says, victory belongs to the most tenacious (La victoire appartient au plus opiniatre). And he is.

Charly dominated the second sleeve before. He made it 4-2 with his second break option and then held on to consolidate the lead and increase it to the rest at the close of the set. The match was ugly, but like those you have to win a lot to succeed in a Grand Slam. That measures the capacity of a star. Londero liked it three years ago in Paris, when with his hair dyed with blonde streaks he reached the second round (Nadal brought him down). It was his first major. Since then, he has not been doing well. To enter this edition he disputed the qualy, because he is now the 141st in the world. That is why his resistance cracked in a third set that ended with a donut for Alcaraz. Carlitos imposed the sweet moment on him, that does not make him lose his humility: “Someone here recognizes me, but not like in Spain”.