Alcaraz wraps up seventh title from nine finals with Tokyo Open win over Fritz | Carlos Alcaraz

After having consoled his opponent and kissed his team at the end of another successful week on the tour, Carlos Alcaraz had only one thought in his mind. He immediately looked for a pair of scissors to finally remove the large bandage wrapped closely around his left ankle.

Having started his week in Tokyo by rolling his ankle and being uncertain about whether he would continue, Alcaraz, ATP No. 1, finished it with his eighth title of the season when he overcome a fiery fight of a victory in Taylor Fritz physically with a victory of 6-4, 6-4.

Throughout the first years of his career, even if he continued to win the greatest titles at a faster pace than almost any other male player in history, the relative inconsistency of Alcaraz had been a dominant story surrounding his career. He addressed these criticisms by bringing together one of the greatest seasons of the last decade, the one who restored him as the best player in the world.

Alcaraz has now reached nine consecutive finals, winning seven titles in the three areas and establishing a record of 66-6 (92%) during individual events this year. At just 22 years old, the six times Grand Slam champion and the world N ° 1 has now won 24 ATP titles.

Last week was particularly difficult. Four games in his first round match against Sebastian Baez, Alcaraz rolled his left ankle. While he was trying to play through pain and find a way to spend this match, he didn’t know if he could continue. Although Alcaraz played the rest of the tournament with his highly recorded ankle, he moved with growing freedom in each match.

During his victory speech, Alcaraz thanked his physio Juanjo Moreno. “Start the week not really good, with the ankle, and the way I came back from this player from such a big tournament, big games, I’m really very happy,” he said.

Fritz, the n ° 4 and the second seeded in the world, entered this final with a full reason to believe that he could win convincingly beating the Spaniard for the first time last week in the Cup washing, where the American played some of the best tennis of his career and led the world team to victory. With an individual online title, however, Alcaraz was clearly behaving at a much higher level from the start.

Although Fritz opened the match using his first destructive service well, playing confident attacking tennis and working through his first service games, Alcaraz gradually taken control of reference exchanges. He dominated with his forehand, currently the biggest weapon in the tour, he exposed the average movement of the American with his drop shots and absorbed Fritz’s first strike with his own spectacular movement.

After conceding his first service match at the end of the first set, Fritz called for the coach and he received a medical time for his left thigh. He was clearly struggling with his movement throughout the second set and he could not push his left leg when he was dragged in the corners. Even in full health, defeating Alcaraz in its current form is a monumental challenge. Here it was just too much.

However, Fritz courageously continued to fight and, not for the first time in his career, Alcaraz began to lose his goal against his hampered opponent. From 5-1 in the second set, Alcaraz rather desperately found himself trying to hold at 5-4, 15-30. He demonstrated his confidence in the last moments by finding his composure precisely when he needed it, hitting three consecutive shooting winners from 15 to 30 to close another victory.