By Chris Oddo | @TheFanChild | Tuesday October 1, 2024
Carlos Alcaraz notched his fourth consecutive victory over Daniil Medvedev, defeating his rival in straight sets to reach the Beijing final.
Photo Source: TTV
Just over a year ago, Carlos Alcaraz suffered a heartbreaking defeat at the hands of Daniil Medvedev at the 2023 US Open. Since then, he has owned the Russian, and taken command of their head-to-head.
The trend continued on Tuesday in Beijing, as Alcaraz weathered early tumult and cruised past Medvedev, 7-5, 6-3, to book a spot in the China Open final.
Alcaraz, who improved to 7-1 in 2024 against the Top-5 and 6-2 overall against Medvedev, could face Jannik Sinner in Wednesday's final. The World No.1 Italian will face China’s Bu Yunchaokete in the second Beijing semifinal.
Alcaraz and Sinner have run the table at the majors in 2024, with each player claiming two Grand Slam singles titles, but it has been the Spaniard who has handled their head-to-head matchup, winning against Sinner at Indian Wells and Roland-Garros en route to titles at both venues.
Alcaraz holds the 5-4 head-to-head edge over Sinner overall.
Against Medvedev the Spaniard demonstrated some scintillating tennis, cracking 25 winners against just 14 unforced errors, and notching five breaks of serve against the fifth-ranked Russian.
Medvedev was tough early, breaking back twice to keep the opening set tight, but he couldn’t keep Alcaraz from breaking and claiming the opening set.
"Tough match for me because I felt that I played really well," he said. "I felt that, yeah, there were a lot of good, positive things for me. At the same time, yeah, it's very, very tough to play Carlos when he's in top form. So yeah, I played pretty good match. I lost. That's not that often it happens to me. Against top players it can happen."
In the second set a right upper leg issue seemed to hamper Medvedev, as he was broken in the fifth game and again while serving to stay alive as Alcaraz converted his fourth match point to lock down victory in one hour and 28 minutes.
“I’m really happy that I didn’t lose my focus too long in the first set,” Alcaraz said. “I recovered it as soon as I got broken, and I’m really happy that at the end of the set I was able to play really good tennis in the return game and then serving at 6-5. I did a really good game. After that, once you are one set up, it’s a little bit easier, playing against Daniil with more confidence.”
Alcaraz stretches his current winning streak to eight and reaches his 21st ATP final (15-5).
He joins Rafael Nadal, Tommy Robredo and David Ferrer as one of four Beijing finalists from Spain.