Championships Queen’s Club Alcaraz advances to its first grass-court final

(London) Spanish prodigy Carlos Alcaraz qualified for the first grass final of his career by logically dominating American Sebastian Korda, 6-3, 6-4, on Saturday at the Queen’s ATP 500 tournament.

On Sunday, if he wins against the Australian Alex de Minaur (N.18 at the ATP), Alcaraz will also regain the place of world number one at the expense of the Serbian Novak Djokovic.

Even if his favorite surface remains clay, the Murcian has shown dazzling progress on grass, and is advancing as a favorite at Wimbledon, the third Grand Slam of the season which begins in a week.

In the Queen’s semi-final on Saturday, if the first set was a bit disjointed with 13 break points in total, Carlos Alcaraz was the strongest in this game by converting two out of eight opportunities against one out of five for Korda, 22. and current 32^e global.

In the second round, the devastating power of the 20-year-old Spaniard, especially in the forehand, allowed him to dominate the proceedings.

He seized the opposing face-off at the first opportunity to lead 2-1 and then no longer be worried, concluding in 1:23 on his second match point.

Previously Holger Rune, 6^e world player, lost in two sets against Alex de Minaur, 6-3, 7-6 (7/2).

The Dane, who had just scored his first three victories on grass, however confirmed that he too was on the way to taming this surface.

He was picked cold with a shutout break from his first engagement by de Minaur, much more experienced on grass.

Ruthless on his serve, the Australian concluded the set by converting his second break point of the match, at 6-3, in 35 minutes.

The second set was more hung, Rune being able to regret not having converted the three break points that he created, in the first and in the 11^e game.

But the Dane also saved three in the 8th^e game, offering himself a tiebreaker where he seemed to be the victim of a sore leg from 5-2 against him, to lose almost without playing the next two points.