If the idea goes ahead, Carlos Alcaraz can scratch the pocket. “Should I buy a house here?” The Spanish wonders after beating Francisco Cerú (6-3 and 7-6 (4) and access for the fourth time consecutive to the semifinals of Indian Wells, luxury frame and great fortunes; Larry Ellison and Bill Gates, without going any further, are usually two fixed in the stands among many others with depth in the checkbook. Feeling as at home in the Californian desert, witness this time of a less bright (or overwhelming) and more worker of the tennis player, demanded from beginning to end by the Argentine and the devils of the climatological factor; another, and ends up landing one more year in the penultimate round of a tournament that is doing his own.
It had been precisely a year that failed to reach this level in a tournament in category 1000, so that it leaves satisfied because it is good, bad, regularly or simply a practical day, today, what is treated at this point is to win, emphasize. “The conditions were worse than yesterday [frente a Grigor Dimitrov]so the start of the game has been complicated for me. He had many opportunities in the first set, but I took advantage of the ones I had. In the end, tennis will win, no matter how you earn it. You can’t be thinking of making it pretty every day. In days like today you must have good attitude and mental hardness. I have not hit the ball as clean as yesterday, but I have done what I had to do, ”he says. And so, Alcaraz is not reason. Ask him if not Nadal Oa Djokovic (Roger Federer, Eternal Dandi, is the exception).
There are days that demand the suit and the bow tie, and those others that in which the good competitor must put on the diver and fake itching stone. If before Dimitrov he dressed as a gala, Alcaraz perceives quick Top-10 and 2-2 against Top-3– And to which the pasture of this track also benefits in which the game takes place in a slower way than usual. The exchanges are lengthened, conditioned by the bursts that are filtered by the octagonal and open structure of the enclosure, and the pulse takes place without a clear dominator until the number three understands that the peak and shovel proceeds. He suffers in the first three service shifts, with options in all of them to close it, and put where he puts the ball, there they arrive the short but electric stride of the Argentine.
He escapes from danger and from the corner, Ferrero tells him that he has to “touch her well,” fed up in the middle of the ventolera. Even so, it ends up calibrating the shot and at the appropriate moment, when the slit finally appears, the second option of Breakit ends up getting the point that unblocks the partial. Achieve that 5-3, it does not fail. Before the roughness, solutions. Nothing to engage from the background, but this time it is convenient to launch with everything to the network, more if it fits when the adversary, very fought, aguerrido and Canchero, has broken the service in the second manga and threatens to destabilize him. Nothing of the sort. It keeps Alcaraz the temper and obtains revenues in the climbs-22 successes in the 31 attempts-to level, and of that adverse 3-1 is passed to 4-4 and the coconut begins to call the door of Cerú, raffled with a splendid globe: Toc-Toc, here I am, small.
Little by little, the gesture to Buenos Aires, 26 years and 26 of the ATP, because he has forgiven too much at the time – of nine in the breakdown options – and intuits the definitive and irremediable awakening of the fiera. Successful instinct. Lord uprising. And executes with coldness that of El Palmar in the tiebreaker. “It was a day to survive, I am proud of what I have done,” he transmits. “The conditions were really hard. I did not feel as good as other days from the bottom, so I had to look for an alternative to be up to it and leaving the network I have competed much better, ”he once appreciated the pass to the semifinals, after an episode of chiaroscuros with the serve and already turned into the third man who manages to chain four successive pressences in the penultimate round after Nadal did (between 2006 and 2013) Djokovic (from 2011 to 2016).
Without giving any set, it will run into the Englishman Jack Draper, another who has not made any concession so far. The British, 23 years old and 14 of the world, rising value, has surpassed Cañonero Ben Shelton (6-4 and 7-4) and will try to redeem himself from abandonment at the intersection between them in Melbourne following an injury. Before that meeting interruptus January, a triumph for the English in Queen’s (2024) and two for Spanish in this same stage (2023) and Basel (2022). “It is very dangerous, one of the most complicated players in the circuit right now. His lifted right boots a lot and his serve is powerful; It has a rhythm from the bottom, many speed and large blows, so I have to be prepared, ”Alcaraz Zanja, while the program will hold the clash between Russian Daniil Medvedev (6-2, 2-6 and 7-6 (7) to Arthur Fils) and the Danish Holger Rune (5-7, 6-0 and 6-3 to Tallon Griekspoor) in the other semifinal.
Keys, the tennis player
AC
You might think of Aryna Sabalenka or IGA Swiatek, but no. The tennis player who marks the passage today and wins incessantly is none other than Madison Keys, after many years of frustrated attempts. The American, 30 years old and fifth in the world, linked her sixteenth victory of the season (double 6-1 to Belinda Bencic) to access the semifinals of the tournament and thus consolidate her magnificent moment.
The next morning to the Belarusian will face the next morning, while on the other side the Polish Swiatek and the young Mirror Andreeva will collide, who continues to shine (7-5 and 6-3 to Elina Svitolina) after having recently triumphed in Dubai. Until now, Keys has not lost any game and has been crowned in Adelaida and the Australian Open, while having never gone so far in California.
