MELBOURNE, Australia – Carlos Alcaraz acknowledged that even though he won the third-round match, he lost the drop shot battle against Corentin Moutet.
That could be a first for the 22-year-old Spaniard, who grew up relentlessly practicing his drop shots and is now chasing a Grand Slam career at the Australian Open.
The left-handed Moutet mixed things up for Alcaraz in an almost festival-like Friday atmosphere at Rod Laver Arena. His mix of drop shots, slices, tweeners, half-volleys, angled volleys and even an underarm serve kept the world number 1 player on his toes.
The 6-2, 6-4, 6-1 victory over number 32 looked like a fairly convincing result, but the match was anything but routine.
“When you play against someone like Corentin, you don’t know what the next step will be,” Alcaraz said in his on-field TV interview. “I had so much fun on the court. As you could see, we both made great shots. Great points.”
Alcaraz laughed as he reflected on his surprise at the end of the first set, when he got tired of tracking down drop shots and told his support team, “I’m not going to run to get that one.”
“I was tired of going to the net,” he said, adding that he looked at the statistics and thought — with a slight exaggeration — “I’ve been to the net 55 times?”
“I thought we were in a drop shot match, but he won!”
There were moments of tension, such as in the second set when Alcaraz relinquished a 3-0 lead when the 26-year-old Frenchman completed a four-game roll.
Ever the showman himself, Alcaraz played a role with some of his own tricks and tweeners. It helped him stay calm.
In the first round, Moutet was booed by the crowd for his underarm serve on match point. There was a lot more love from the Australian crowd this time.
After winning a point near the end of the match with a perfect deep lob into the corner, he delivered an iconic fist-pump celebration.
When he sustained that game with a winning volley, he marked it by removing his cap.
Alcaraz will play the following Sunday against No. 19 Tommy Paul, who advanced when Alejandro Davidovich Fokina retired with an injury after losing the first two sets 6-1, 6-1.
“We have great battles against each other,” Alcaraz said. “The matches against each other are always of a good level.”
In other men’s matches Friday, Daniil Medvedev rallied from two sets down for a 6-7 (5), 4-6, 7-5, 6-0, 6-3 comeback victory over Fabian Marozsan, the fifth time he has come from 0-2 down to win a Grand Slam match.
“I wasn’t calm after the first set because I was angry with myself for not doing better. It cost me in the second set,” said Medvedev, the 2021 US Open champion and three-time Australian Open runner-up. In the third: “I really had to let it go. Just think about what I have to do.”
He did that, and now he finds himself in a rematch with Learner Tien, the American who upset him in a five-setter in the second round last year.
The 25th-seeded Tien again advanced to the fourth round with a 7-6 (9), 6-4, 6-2 victory over Nuno Borges.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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