Another day on the American hard court tour that sees Alcaraz suffer again and sweat profusely to win the game. Despite feeling more comfortable this time around than the past two weeks, he faced a serve and net bomber that barely left the rest of the options like Max Purcell. The Murcian prevailed in another back-and-forth game but with each passing day he’s making greater strides towards his goal of regaining his best level for the US Open. He came back from the set, dominated in the second and knew how to suffer in the third and is decisive in the semifinals where Pole Hubert Hurkacz (20th in the ranking) awaits him.
The Murcian made his debut against Purcell (70th overall), who was making his second Masters 1000 despite being 26 years old. The Australian used to play doubles and his style confirmed that. Great server who goes to the net quickly to take the point on both serve and return. Alcaraz couldn’t be trusted either, having already surprised Canada by eliminating hosts Aliassime and knocking out Ruud and Wawrinka in Cincinnati.
And the Aussie came out uncomplicated, with a good serve and net, while the Murcian responded with great serve and connecting passes in the face of the rival’s constant increases. The games followed one another until, at the worst moment, Alcaraz faltered and lost serve to the Australian, who was 5-3. It was down again for the Spaniard who had to come back up when he felt more comfortable. He tried and defended, but Purcell’s serves were rockets and he won the first set 6-4.
“You have to watch everything that leaves us,” Ferrero warned him, aware that opportunities to break his serve would be few and that he would need to be more precise than ever to do so. And it was applied again by the number one who began to see the holes in the Australian Wall and made it 3-0 with his first break of the game. From there, patience before Purcell’s serves and focus not to lose the valuable income.
He had to throw his wrist more than ever to get past Purcell at the net. He was either looking for the angle, or he was shooting at the feet. But in the end Carlitos found the formula to face the doubles’ strong performances and as he also dominated at the bottom of the pitch, he won the second set (6-3) and leveled the battle.
For the fifth game in a row, the number one went into the third set and the patterns of all games repeated. Carlitos collapsed, growing as he hadn’t been seen throughout the tour, and had three break points to put the pass down the stretch in the semifinals, but the irregularity returned and Purcell recovered and made it 3-3. The final phase of the game was reached and again there was uncertainty in the atmosphere. The number one felt good, but one wrong move doomed him to elimination. He moved over the wire again but this time Alcaraz was Alcaraz again, he knew how to suffer, he got his game back and had a great game against Purcell (4-6, 6-3 and 6-4). Now it’s his turn to show off his progress against another server that was already troubling him last week: Poland’s Hubert Hurkacz. The days go by, the draw gets smaller and all roads lead to a final against Novak Djokovic.
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