No.5 seed American Taylor Fritz couldn’t stop the defending Champion Carlos Alcaraz from his effort to win the Wimbledon title for the third time in succession.
Though Fritz had been playing very well on grass this season winning titles in Stuttgart and at Eastbourne in London, he found that overcoming Alcaraz on green lawns at Wimbledon was a different kettle of fish altogether.!
The American had a bad start to the match losing his very first service game at 30-40 to go 0-1 down. Carlos is experienced enough now not to let slip away such an initial lead in the first set in a Grand Slam semi-final match. He served extremely well to take the first set 6-4, though he was not able to break the serve of the American again in that set.
All was going well for the defending Champion, but at 0-15, 5-6; Fritz struck a stunning return for a clean winner on a serve that was fired at 134 mph from Alcaraz. He broke it for a love game to take the second set 7-5.
Carlos broke straight back on Fritz first service game to love in the 3rd set. Alcaraz didn’t have to look back from there as he went on to win a great match in all respect till the end, in which Fritz had a golden opportunity on his serve to take in into a five-setter in the 4th Set tie-break.
That said, the American can hold his head extremely high as he played fantastic tennis at the All-England Club this year, winning two of the toughest 5-sets matches in the first and second round to reach this stage for the first time in his career. He just couldn’t go further as he was stopped by none other than the defending Champion, who had defeated 7-times winner Novak Djokovic in the last two years in Championship matches.
Since his first match here at Wimbledon, Carlos has been improving steadily. As the tournament progressed, his level had continued to rise. His mental toughness, physical strength and technical brilliance is only going up as he gets matured👍
Carlos’ baseline plays and all-around shot making capabilities are superior to Fritz anyway. Plus, his skills to play the drop-shots at the right time put Fritz in lots of trouble. Even the current World No.1 Sinner had experienced it in their last four or five encounters.
If Alcaraz can keep this form and serve so well in the Championship match on Sunday, the Spaniard might as well win a Hat-Trick at Wimbledon and join the legends Bjorn Borg and Rafa Nadal as the only other players who could win both French Open and Wimbledon in the same year twice in the “Open Era”. Rod Laver won both in 1969 though.
Nadal had achieved this feat in the years 2008 & 2010, while Borg was successful in doing so for a hat-trick of years – 1978, 1979 & 1980.
BIG Congratulations and Good Luck to Carlos in the Finals of Wimbledon on Sunday evening👏👏
