PARIS: Carlos Alcaraz produced his best display of the tournament to line up a quarter-final rematch with Stefanos Tsitsipas at the French Open, while Iga Swiatek ramped up her bid for a third successive Roland Garros title with a 40-minute blitz on Sunday.

Alcaraz says he feels much more like himself in Paris after an injury-hit build-up saw him sidelined by a sore forearm for almost a month.

His 6-3, 6-3, 6-1 win over Canadian 21st seed Auger-Aliassime suggested he is rounding into top form, sending an ominous signal to his rivals as he made the last eight for the third year in succession.

The Spaniard pumped 34 winners past Auger-Aliassime as the persistent rain which heavily disrupted the first week of the tournament finally relented, allowing matches on the two main courts to go ahead without the need for their retractable roofs.

Alcaraz moves on to play Tsitsipas after the 2021 Roland Garros runner-up fended off Italy’s Matteo Arnaldi 3-6, 7-6 (7-4), 6-2, 6-2, the turning point coming in the second set when he saved four set points.

Alcaraz boasts a 5-0 career head-to-head record over Tsitsipas with three wins on clay, including a straight-sets victory in the French Open quarter-finals a year ago.

Earlier in the day, women’s world number one Iga Swiatek of Poland demolished Russia’s Anastasia Potapova 6-0, 6-0, dropping only 10 points in the shortest completed match of her career.

Swiatek is a red-hot favourite to lift the Coupe Suzanne Lenglen and become only the fourth woman to win four Roland Garros titles in the Open era.

She next plays Wimbledon champion Marketa Vondrous­ova of the Czech Republic, the fifth seed who routed Serbian qualifier Olga Danilovic 6-4, 6-2.

US Open champion Coco Gauff made light work of Elisa­betta Cocciaretto, sweeping past the Italian 6-1, 6-2.

Cocciaretto had taken down two seeds to reach the last 16 of a major for the first time but was no match for third seed Gauff.

The American advances to a quarter-final with three-time Grand Slam finalist and eighth seed Ons Jabeur, who beat Den­m­ark’s Clara Tauson 6-4, 6-4.

DJOKOVIC INTO LAST 16

Novak Djokovic avoided cras­h­ing to his worst defeat at the French Open in 15 years in the early hours of Sunday morning when he clinched a five-set victory over Italy’s Lorenzo Musetti.

Defending champion and 24-time Grand Slam title winner Djokovic came from two sets to one down to triumph 7-5, 6-7 (6-8), 2-6, 6-3, 6-0 in a third-round match which ended at 3:07am (0107 GMT).

The top seed player’s four-hour 29-minute victory also allowed the world number one to equal Roger Federer’s record of 369 Grand Slam match wins.

His reward is a clash with Francisco Cerundolo of Argen­tina for a place in the quarters. Cerundolo beat Tommy Paul of the US 3-6, 6-3, 6-3, 6-2 in their third-round match on Saturday.

Seventh seed Casper Ruud of Norway defeated Argentina’s Tomas Etcheverry 6-4, 1-6, 6-2, 6-2 in a match which ended shortly before 1:00am.

He next faces Taylor Fritz of the US who defeated Australian Thanasi Kokkinakis 6-3, 6-2, 6-7 (4-7), 5-7, 6-3.

Published in Dawn, June 3rd, 2024