Carlos Alcaraz has beaten Felix Auger-Aliassime to make it through to Sunday’s men’s tennis singles final.
The 21-year-old French Open and Wimbledon champion saw off his Canadian opponent in straight sets, winning 6-1 6-1 in 1 hour 15 minutes.
Competing in his first Olympic Games, the Spaniard became the youngest Olympic finalist since tennis returned to the games at Seoul 1988.
He only dropped 10 points on serve throughout the whole match, breaking Auger-Aliassime’s serve twice in both sets to dominate a one-sided semi-final.
Alcaraz will now face either Novak Djokovic or Lorenzo Musetti in the gold medal match.
He will fancy his chances on Roland Garros’ clay courts too, having not lost a singles match at the venue since the 2023 semi-final against the Serbian world No. 2.
The match got off to a cagey start, Auger-Aliassime using his powerful serve and volley to get a foothold in the game and both players winning their opening service games to make it 1-1.
But Alcaraz’ strength soon started to shine through. Moving around the court with ease, he forced his opponent to fight for every point when on serve, while the Spaniard’s own service games were wrapped up with ease.
The world No. 3 took the second of two break points in the fourth game and it was one-way traffic from thereon, Alcaraz wrapping up the first set in 40 minutes.
While Auger-Aliassime appeared to have stemmed the flow by winning his first service game in the second set to make it 1-1, his looked leggy.
The Canadian’s efforts in the mixed doubles – where he’d reached the semi-finals – appeared to be catching up with him, and he had no answer for Alcaraz’s probing play.
When the four-time Grand Slam winner broke despite being 40-15 down in the fourth game of the second to make it 3-1, the writing was on the wall for the semi-final.
Racing to the finish, Alcaraz appeared unstoppable, and it will take a heroic effort to prevent him picking up an Olympic gold medal at his first attempt.
But in potential finalist Novak Djokovic, he could face an opponent looking to add a golden touch on an already glittering career – the 24-time Grand Slam winner’s bronze in Beijing 2008 is his best Olympic result.
