Third-seeded Carlos Alcaraz outlasted Jesper De Jong on Wednesday to advance to the third round of the French Open in Paris.
Alcaraz fended off the feisty 23-year-old qualifier from the Netherlands before winning the match’s final five games to capture a 6-3, 6-4, 2-6, 6-2 victory in 3 hours and 8 minutes.
“The third set I needed to forget about putting on a show and put myself in the chance of putting myself in the rallies,” the 21-year-old Spaniard said. “It was difficult for me to do it. I was in trouble a little bit but I am very happy to do it at the end.”
Alcaraz recorded 35 winners against 47 unforced errors to set up a match against Sebastian Korda or Soonwoo Kwon of South Korea. The Korda-Kwon match was suspended in the first set as rain halted play on the outside courts.
“As I have said many times, any player can put you in trouble,” Alcaraz said, referring to the 176th-ranked De Jong. “You have to be very focused every match and every point and every round. It does not matter if I am at the top of the rankings and playing someone outside the Top 100. You have to think you have to play at your best if you want to get through. The ranking doesn’t matter, it matters the level to keep going and I am sure he will break the Top 100.”
Also on Wednesday, sixth-seeded Russian Andrey Rublev notched a 6-3, 6-4, 6-3 win over Spaniard Pedro Martinez and ninth-seeded Stefanos Tsitsipas secured a 6-3, 6-2, 6-7 (2), 6-4 victory over German Daniel Altmaier.
Rubley collected 56 winners and broke Martinez’s serve five times in 2 hours and 45 minutes. He will square off against the winner of the match between Frenchman Alexandre Muller or Italian Matteo Arnaldi.
Tsitsipas set the tone with 27 winners in the first two sets. He will face the winner of the match between Lorenzo Sonego of Italy or Zhang Zhizhen of China.
“Having the crowd by my side this morning has been incredible,” Tsitsipas said. “It felt amazing. To get to play such marvelous tennis. I really enjoyed it.”
–Field Level Media
