No. 1 Carlos Alcaraz keeps rolling at rain-plagued Wimbledon
Carlos Alcaraz played for the second straight day at Wimbledon and won again.
So did Christopher Eubanks, Aryna Sabalenka and Petra Kvitova.
Stefanos Tsitsipas also won a match for the second day in a row, but on his fifth consecutive day on court.
The rain early in the week at the All England Club has caused some chaos with the schedule, forcing many players to get on court day after day. Even more rain came Saturday, delaying the proceedings briefly.
The backlog hasn’t seemed to slow down Alcaraz, a 20-year-old Spaniard who is seeded No. 1 and is considered to be the next big star in men’s tennis. Playing under the roof on Centre Court, Alcaraz advanced to the fourth round at Wimbledon for the second straight year by beating No. 25 Nicolas Jarry 6-3, 6-7 (6), 6-3, 7-5.
“Stay focused all the time,” Alcaraz said on court. “I knew I was going to have my chances.”
Alcaraz, last year’s U.S. Open champion, reached the semifinals at the French Open — losing to eventual champion Novak Djokovic — but came into the Wimbledon tournament after winning a grass-court title at Queen’s Club. He next will face 2021 runner-up Matteo Berrettini for a quarterfinal berth. Berrettini defeated No. 19 Alexander Zverev 6-3, 7-6 (4), 7-6 (6).
Eubanks, out in the open on Court 18, is a 27-year-old American playing at Wimbledon for the first time. He beat Christopher O’Connell 7-6 (5), 7-6 (3), 7-6 (2) to stay undefeated at the All England Club at 3-0, though he complained about hating to play on grass as recently as a month ago
“It’s slowly, slowly growing on me,” he said. “But at this point, I think borderline I might say it’s my favorite surface.”
Andy Murray lost a five-set match to Stefanos Tsitsipas on Friday in a second-round match at Wimbledon that lasted 4 1/2 hours across two days.
Tsitsipas already has eliminated two Grand Slam champions — Dominic Thiem and Andy Murray. On his fifth day in a row on court, he advanced to the fourth round at Wimbledon for only the second time by eliminating Laslo Djere 6-4, 7-6 (5), 6-4.
Eubanks and Tsitsipas next will play each other Monday for the spot in the quarterfinals.
Third-seeded Daniil Medvedev, another player back out on court after a win Friday, beat Marton Fucsovics 4-6, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 on No. 1 Court to reach the fourth round for the second time.
No. 10 Frances Tiafoe, a 25-year-old American, was among the players whose third-round contests were affected by the rain. His match was early in the third set after he dropped the first two against three-time major semifinalist Grigor Dimitrov when they were sent home for the evening.
The women’s tournament also has been disrupted by the weather. The second-seeded Sabalenka, who missed last year’s Wimbledon when players from Belarus and Russia were banned because of the war in Ukraine, defeated Anna Blinkova 6-2, 6-3. Kvitova, a two-time Wimbledon champion, beat Natalija Stevanovic 6-3, 7-5 in a match that was suspended late in the second set by more than two hours because of the early showers.
“It was a tough one, for sure, especially with the rain delay,” said Kvitova, who won her Wimbledon titles in 2011 and 2014. “It’s nothing easy to deal with.”
Later Saturday, sixth-seeded Ons Jabeur rallied to knock off Bianca Andreescu, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4, and defending champion Elena Rybakina rolled past Katie Boulter of Britain 6-1, 6-1.
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