Carlos Alcaraz focused on steady improvement, not top ranking
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Carlos Alcaraz hitting a shot during his 6-1, 6-1 Indian Wells win over Grigor Dimitrov on March 12.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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INDIAN WELLS – World No. 3 Carlos Alcaraz said reclaiming top spot in the rankings is not his foremost priority over the next few months as the Spaniard looks to avoid any additional pressure in the search for his best form.
Alcaraz hammered Grigor Dimitrov 6-1, 6-1 on March 12 to reach the quarter-finals of Indian Wells, where the 21-year-old is gunning for a third successive title to match Roger Federer (2004-06) and Novak Djokovic (2014-16) in achieving the feat.
While Alcaraz cannot leapfrog the top-ranked Jannik Sinner and No. 2 Alexander Zverev by winning the trophy this week, it could leave him primed to make his move during the European clay-court swing where he will defend his French Open crown.
“I’m not thinking much about recovering the No. 1 in two or three months. That could make me feel extra pressure,” Alcaraz, who previously held top spot for 36 weeks, told reporters.
Alcaraz will be among the main contenders at tournaments in the coming weeks with Italian Sinner serving a doping ban until May 4, but the Spaniard said he will take things day by day.
“If I’m doing the right things, if I’m focused on every day and the things I have to improve, the result is going to be there and then the No. 1 is going to come after,” he added.
“Right now, I’m focused on this tournament, Indian Wells, and I want to still play good tennis. Hopefully, make the final or lift the trophy. That’s my goal here.”
Up next for the four-time Grand Slam champion is 26th-ranked Argentinian Francisco Cerundolo.
“He’s playing great. I don’t know which surface is his favourite, clay or hard court. He plays really well on both. Even grass, too. That means he’s a complete player,” Alcaraz said.
“He can play really good tennis on every surface... I’ll have to be really focused on my tennis. I’ll try to play aggressively with passion. It’s going to be a difficult one.”
Elsewhere in the men’s draw, Briton Jack Draper took down home contender and former champion Taylor Fritz 7-5, 6-4 to reach the quarter-finals for the first time, where he will play 11th seed Ben Shelton.
“I played a really high-level match. I think I struggled here in the past with my serve, but I thought that I served great today, and I think that put a lot of pressure on him,” said US Open semi-finalist and world No. 14 Draper.
Shelton advanced with a 7-6 (8-6), 6-1 win over fellow American Brandon Nakashima.
The women’s draw also saw the demise of a home contender as Belinda Bencic pulled off an upset against third seed Coco Gauff
In a tightly contested third set, the Swiss wildcard came back from 0-40 down to break for a 5-4 lead and closed out the victory on her first match point when the American ripped a forward long.
“Obviously, this is why you are practising and working hard all your life. The way you cheered before the match... I had chills and goosebumps,” Bencic said in her on-court interview.
The Tokyo Olympic singles champion will next face another home hope in Australian Open winner Madison Keys, who tallied a 15th straight victory by beating Croatia’s Donna Vekic 4-6, 7-6 (9-7), 6-3.
Vekic, the silver medallist in Paris, showed terrific defence in winning the first set, fending off three break points in the second game and another in the fourth.
She had a 5-3 lead in the second set tiebreak but Keys dug in her heels, clinching it with an unreturnable serve as the Croat thrust her racquet to the court in frustration.
“Sometimes after a close tiebreaker and winning the set and kind of having a little bit of, like, a surge of energy and everything, sometimes you can get almost a little bit too amped,” said Keys.
“So I just wanted to try to play really tough the first game and just try to get the thing that I was doing well in order to close out that set.”
Keys did exactly that, taking the momentum from the tiebreak and breaking Vekic to open the third. She closed out the comeback win with one of her lethal forehands to wild cheers from the home fans.
Meanwhile, top seed Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus easily dispatched British lucky loser Sonay Kartal 6-1, 6-2 and will meet Russian Liudmila Samsonova in the last eight. REUTERS, AFP
