With his first victory against his childhood idol, his compatriot Rafael Nadal, the Murcian surpassed the record previously held by Canadian Denis Shapovalov as the youngest player to reach the penultimate round of the Madrid Masters 1000.
‘Carlitos’ Alcaraz He never tires of setting records for precociousness in the world of tennis. The player from Murcia, who from next Monday will be at least the sixth best in the world, achieved his first victory in the circuit ATP against his compatriot Rafael Nadal in the quarterfinals of the Mutua Madrid Open 2022.
This victory, together with the previous ones against Nikoloz Basilashvili and Cameron Norrie, allow the tennis player from El Palmar set a new milestone in his short professional career by becoming the youngest player (19 years and one day) to compete in the semifinals of this event, surpassing the mark that the Canadian had until today Denis Shapovalovwhat in 2018 and with 19 years and a month he also stood in the penultimate round of the Madrid tournament after getting off consecutively Tennys Sandgren, Benoit Pair, Milos Raonic y Kyle Edmund. Shapovalov would end up falling to the eventual champion, the German Alexander Zverev.
The youngest in the semifinals of the Masters 1000 Madrid
The top5 of the youngest tennis players to reach the semifinals in Madrid are completed by: Rafael Nadal (19 years and five months), Novak Djokovic (20 years and five months) and Juan Martin del Potro (20 years and eight months). Of all of them, the only one who would end up proclaiming himself champion would be none other than the man from Manacorí. In 2005 and already number two in the world, he would beat Victor Hanescu, Tommy Robredo, Radek Stepanek, Robbie Ginepri e Ivan Ljubicic in an epic final coming back two sets to love.
In the case of Djokovic and Del Potro, they both achieved it in the years 2007 y 2009, respectively. The Balkan came to that edition already fully settled in third place in the ATP ranking. He would later end up giving in to the Argentine David Nalbandian in semifinals. Del Potro, meanwhile, beat the British Andy Murray in the quarterfinals of 13 years. This was the first edition of this event on clay. However, the man from Tandil could not continue beyond that penultimate round when he clearly fell to another later champion, the Swiss Roger Federer.
We’ll see if the good of ‘Charlie Brown‘ can emulate Nadal and snatch the record for the youngest champion of this tournament. To do this, tomorrow he will have another new and demanding challenge to face the current number one in the world, the Serbian Novak Djokovic, for the first time. If he manages to beat the Serb, Alcaraz would also become the first man to defeat Djokovic and Nadal back-to-back on clay.
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