Barcelona, (EFE).- The Spanish Carlos Alcaraz, current Conde de Godó Trophy champion, qualified for the quarterfinals of the tournament after defeating his compatriot Roberto Bautista, 6-3, 7-5, in one hour 53 minutes of the game.
Alcaraz, Godó’s first favorite, will face this Friday in the quarterfinals, in another Spanish duel, Alejandro Davidovich, executioner this Thursday of the Finnish Emil Ruusuvuori (6-4 and 7-5).
The Murcian showed before Bautista why he is currently the second racket in the world and one of the fittest players at the moment. And that his opponent held out for 54 minutes before delivering the first set, and even went ahead with the first ‘break’ of the match to get 3-2.
But Alcaraz returned the break in the following game and, patiently, building each point from the bottom to finish it off with a drop shot or volley into the net, he broke his serve again in the eighth to close the first set (6-3 ).
Carlos Alcaraz sped up at the start of the second to break his opponent’s serve again and get up 2-0, he even had a ‘break’ ball to make it 3-0, which Bautista saved.
The man from Castellón is one of those types of players who never delivers a match and managed to break his opponent’s serve, who recovered it, returning the break in the following game to go up 4-3.
But Alcaraz, who alternated great shots with some incomprehensible unforced error, then gave up his serve again and Bautista won his to go ahead again 4-5.
There ended the resistance of the Castellón, who had lost his only previous duel against the Murcian (in the round of 16 of Indian Wells in 2022) and launched a defeat on land against him this Thursday. The ‘Carlitosmanía’ will continue one more day at the RCT Barcelona-1899.