There were some serious injury doubts about Carlos Alcaraz leading up to his first match at the 2024 Madrid Open, but he erased all of them with a spectacular performance.
This is Alcaraz's first big clay event this year. He played briefly in South America, but that wasn't a long stay on the surface, and he barely played any matches. He didn't look good or comfortable, so many wondered how the European swing would go.
Having to withdraw from the Barcelona Open and the Monte-Carlo Masters certainly wasn't ideal, and the way Alcaraz spoke ahead of his first match in the Spanish capital didn't really calm anybody down.
He's generally been a player who easily dismisses any injury worries, but this time around, he was quite reserved in his stance. He also hinted at possibly not playing.
That wouldn't have been good for the back-to-back defending champion. Ultimately, he played and he played superb tennis against Alexander Shevchenko in the second round of the ATP Masters 1000 tournament.
There was never a moment of doubt that Alcaraz would win this match anything but easily after he came out firing early on. Shevchenko is no stranger to clay tennis, but he was easily overmatched in this match.
The Spaniard served well, putting a lot of pressure on his opponent. His cross-court backhand also did a lot of damage, as Shevchenko's backhand had no shot of withstanding that pressure.
Overall, it was just a fantastic display from the defending champion. He played with an arm brace, but he wasn't missing much, and he put a solid amount of power in his shots.
The first set was a 6-2 win for Alcaraz, who had no issues against erratic Shevchenko, who had zero winners, while Alcaraz had nine.
The second set didn't offer anything new either, as Alcaraz broke early to take another early lead and then finished it off swiftly. The final score was 6-2, 6-1 in a little over an hour of play.