TURIN (ITALPRESS) – Carlos Alcaraz defeated Lorenzo Musetti in the final group match of the “Connors” ATP Finals, which took place in Turin, at the Inalpi Arena. 6-4 6-1 the score was in favor of the Spaniard, after one hour and 24 minutes of play: a result that had a double meaning for Alcaraz, who achieved the third victory of the three matches played in the “Masters” group, taking the lead, but above all, ensuring to end the year as number one in the ATP rankings. After an even first set won by Alcaraz thanks to a break in the tenth game, the second set saw the Spaniard take the lead against Carrarino, who in the end lost clarity and freshness: so the broken break point canceled in the second game was just an anticipation of the two consecutive breaks that occurred in the fourth and sixth games. Midway through, two counter break points were canceled out by Alcaraz, who still closed the score on the third match point at the turn of the seventh service game.
This defeat led to Musetti’s elimination: in second place in the group, in fact, was Alex de Minaur (with the elimination of Fritz). The Australian will now face Jannik Sinner (matched tomorrow at 2pm against Ben Shelton in his final round robin match) in the semifinals on Saturday.
“It means a lot to me to be first in the world: this has always been a dream. At the beginning of the year I saw that number one was still very far away, because Jannik Sinner played well and won all the tournaments, but since the middle of the season I set this goal for myself, because I thought it was achievable. I played great tennis in many tournaments in a row, we fought shoulder to shoulder.” That’s Carlos Alcaraz, after the win against Musetti. “I’m happy to see Lorenzo in this tournament – added the Spaniard -. He’s a great player, we’ve grown together and playing with him at this stage is a pleasure. It’s difficult to play against him, because he can do anything: you always have to be attentive. At the start of the match we both played with energy, maybe his physicality deteriorated a bit and I improved a lot”.
– Ipa Agency photo –
(ITALPRES).
