Monfils puts Alcaraz in a "problem"

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It shouldn't have been easy for Carlos Alcaraz to deal with the end of the match against Gael Monfils the previous night. Just when he was close to victory, the rain came and halted everything completely. With the typical tension of knowing he couldn't go to a third set against the Frenchman to avoid arriving too tired for the third-round match against Rune, Carlitos hit the court trying to close the match quickly.

The issue for the Murcian was that he didn't have much advantage for that. Despite regaining the minibreak right at the start, he didn't perform very well with his serve and needed to use several second serves, which Gael took advantage of to recover the minibreak and finish off the set with powerful serves.

The wind wreaked havoc and appeared as a surprise guest to the match. Both had a hard time controlling their serves with this element, with the Spaniard being the one who suffered the most to the point of smashing his racket on the ground as he didn't feel any connection with the ball. An image that quickly spread on the internet and will surely haunt him for a long time.

Although Alcaraz was playing one of his worst matches in a long time (due to the wind and other factors), he wasn't far behind Monfils. The Frenchman, however, managed to save all the tough moments he faced in the form of break points against him. Seeing that Carlitos wasn't at his best, he simply kept the ball in play and added more doubts to his opponent's mind.

A single break was enough for Monfils to secure his victory over an Alcaraz who will leave Cincinnati with more doubts than he would have wished for. Perhaps it wasn't the right moment or day, considering the conditions, but certainly the image he left today had nothing to do with the one he left yesterday in the first set against a Gael who achieves his best victory in a long time.

There's no need for alarm bells, as he has earned plenty of margin to arrive at the US Open with renewed energy, but we will see how he manages what happened today, racket break included, leading up to the fourth and final Grand Slam of the year. He arrived at Wimbledon with an early defeat in Queen's and two weeks later left London with the title in hand, but today's events do leave us a bit concerned.

This news is an automatic translation. You can read the original news, Monfils mete en un "problema" a Alcaraz