Three years ago I wrote that Carlos Alcaraz has the making of being a top class tennis player comibng through from tje unior ranls. Yout comments were that he is just anothing Chang type and he will not win more Major Championshps
Are you ready to admit that you were wrong about him after the tennis lessons he gave Djokovic and Sinner in New York?
Once again you misrepresent the case. I said Alcaraz is a complete player at 20, but he would have to stay fit for a long time to match the Joker’s Major total. I still think with his heavily muscled body, he is likely to run into a physical brick wall like Nadal.
As for the best player this year, Sinner won Oz and Wimbledon. Traz won the French and the US Open. They both had great years. On balance given 2 head to head victories in the Majors vs one for Sinner, I’d give it to Alcaraz.
But wasn’t Rublev your pick as the next great player?
Perhaps I should remind you of how a 37 year old man took down Carlos:
Novak Djokovic produced yet another scarcely-believable comeback to stun Carlos Alcaraz in a thriller and reach the Australian Open semi-finals.
The 37-year-old Serb defied injury, age and ranking to win 4-6 6-4 6-3 6-4 against his 21-year-old opponent in Melbourne.
"It was possibly one of the best matches of the tournament on the men's side," said Djokovic.
"It felt like a final of a Slam and I wish it was. We both gave it our all."
Djokovic, going for a record-extending 11th men's singles title, limped around Rod Laver Arena at the end of the first set with a problem in his upper left leg.
But, after going off court for treatment, he recovered impressively to continue his bid for a 25th Grand Slam triumph - which would be an all-time record.
Djokovic played aggressively until the pain wore off, which then allowed him to move more freely and take control.
Spanish third seed Alcaraz became increasingly animated as he struggled to figure out how to turn an engrossing contest back in his favour.
When seventh seed Djokovic sealed victory - at 00:57 local time after a battle lasting three hours and 38 minutes - he roared towards coach Andy Murray.
There will be new potentially great players emerge in the next 5 years and the 5years after that and the years starting when Alcaraz is 35. Will he be winning then, the way the Joker did?
By the way the following is a clanger too -
I still think with his heavily muscled body, he is likely to run into a physical brick wall like Nadal.
Alcaraz is a rather small player weighing only 74 kgs and is 6' tall. That is very small compared to Djokovic and Sinner and he is not a particularly heavily muscled - in fact is a smallish and a rather small and slim person. That is why he is called Carlito (small Carlos) by his fellow players.
The way he reads matches and he is playing indicates he has the best coach in the business - Juan Carlos Ferrero - who was also called small in built and as a result called Mosquito by his fellow players, In other word he outwits his opponents during games and keep on testing players until they fold.
You do not know neither do I - but then you wrote a doomsdaay forexcast three years ago and even in that you made a clanger as well.
You better read the followung as well:-
When Carlos Alcaraz showed up to begin his journey to a second U.S. Open title, he debuted a head shaved almost to the scalp.
The explanation was that his brother, Alvaro, had used the wrong clippers, botching the haircut so badly that he needed to start fresh.
But by the end of the tournament Sunday, when Alcaraz re-claimed the No. 1 ranking from his primary rival Jannik Sinner with a 6-2, 3-6, 6-1, 6-4 victory, the military-style crew cut seemed less like a mistake and more of a message.
With the ability to launch an all-out assault on the tennis record books, Alcaraz means business. And the Big Three of Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer need to understand that the young man from Murcia, Spain, is on pace to pass them all.
At 22 years, 4 months and 2 days old, Alcaraz became the youngest player in the Open Era to win six major titles. He did it in a US Open where he had full command over his game for nearly every second of every match, dropping just one set en route to the trophy. He did it with a relentlessness and efficiency he had not displayed in any of the 18 Grand Slams he played before this one. And he did it in a way that suggests he’s just getting started.
“When you achieve the goals you set for yourself at the beginning of the year, it feels amazing,” he said. “One of the first goals I had during the season was to try to recover the No. 1 as soon as possible or end the year as No. It is a dream. Doing it the same day as getting another Grand Slam feels even better. It’s everything I’m working for.”
Maybe you should bear in mind that Djokovic, Nadal or Federer won that many major titles at the age of 22 years 6 months. Sinner at 24 yeasrs of age won only 4 Major titles thus far,
Fair enough….but the Joker, Nadal and Roger were playing each other. Alcaraz has Sinner, but he isn’t quite at the same level. Things will get more difficult….in sports nothing is forever.
That said there were some spectacular points in the USOpen final. What wasn’t so cool was the serving. Alcaraz was okay at 61%, he was being aggressive. Sinner was at 49% far too low. That was probably the biggest factor in Sinner being broken.
There is no way of knowing if Sinner lost because of his serve…but it’s certainly an area where major improvement is possible.
Mozart
I agree with you that in tennis the situation is unpredictable and that is why so many top ten players collapsed due to psychological reasons. You refer to Rublev who for a year could hardly win anyhing due to depression - but there are others as well, Medvedev for a short while was no 1 player in h world and is now no 18 in the worlfd - Tsitsipas was for a short time the no 3 player in the world and is now no 27 in the world - Shapovalov was for a while no 7 in the world and is now no 26. Another top 10 playe was Norrie who are now outside of the top 32 ranked players/
Compare to the players listed by me at least Auger-Aliassime and Rublev are fighting back and moving up in the rankings getting better and they would end up in the number 10 rankings the other players are psychological wrecks with no sign of real recovery. Rublev has a problem though - he dares not go back to Russia while the war is ongoing since he donated huge amounts of money to welfare organizations helping kids in Ukraine and openly oppose the War and would end up in jail. As an extemely religious person he is against wars - his tennis was suffering and it took the form of depression particularly since the start of the War in Ukraine and the medical specialists describe depression pills to take daily as a result - but the other mentioned players do not have that problem and those relate to stress factors inherent in the sport of tennis and not outside issues applicable to Rublev.
The players l mentioned are all in their twenties and should be in fine form - but they are not.
As to Sinner he started playing professional tennis at the age of 18 - while Alcarz turned professional at the age of 17. Sinner is now 24 tyears old and gis progress in performances were slower than it was the case with Alcaraz - who is now 22 years of age,
In general the situation was that since 2003 here were three top class players in Djokovic, Nadal and Federer all ruling the tennis world for more than 15 years - a unique situation never found befoe in the tennis pofessional era - and that era started ending in 2021 with both Federer and Nadal out of playing professional playes and Djokovic on the way out as well.
So at present the top 2 are Alcaraz and Sinner - but despite winning in Melbourne and London in the majors ere not really goofd nough against unseeded players in the USA open and lost hsi number 1 ranking as a result, I am not sure about Sinner's future as well. His performnces this yea was impacted pon was aa ban as a result of a perfirmance enhancing drug he was tested for. He recived four months ban - not affecting the Majors - but he seems to be not doing s well as he did last year and I agree with you his serving against Alcaraz was poor - but so was his pefomances against the unranked players he played against before he met Auger-Aliassime in the semi's which turnmed out to be difficult for him as well. On the whole a top class player - but already showing signs of stress issues as well.
The fact is there are younger players showing signs of improvement like the 20 year old Mensik. the 18 year old Moller amd Fonseca and the 17 year old Engel - but whether they will reach the top ten rankings are not clear t present, In tennis there is a real similarity with the saying - in the land of the blind cockeye is king. So what will happen over the next five years is really unpredictable. The only predctable case is in fact Alcaraz that will rule the tennis world over the said period.
In the next month the tennis dseries move to China, Japan and Khayakstan with 6 tournaments be lined up and those include 3 ATP 250 tournaments - 2 ATP 500 tournaments and 1 ATP 1000 torunament. The frst two tirnaments start on 17 September - but nobody knows yet who will turn up tp play other than the nomination lists of the tournaments and for he two Chibnes T250 tournments the nominees are as follows:-
Chengdu = Draper, Musetti, Griekspoor
Hangzhou = Khachanov, Rublev and Medvedev
However - actual nominatons are often not playing on ATP 250 level - so whether the 6 top 32 players turn up to play is really unpredictable and we should know by next Monday as to who would in fact turn up to play and in the past seeded playes were not always turning up after the draw and that cause havoc in respect of the seedings
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