Carlos Alcaraz confirmed that he was hitting his forehand freely in his win against Sebastian Korda on Friday at the 2024 Roland Garros.
The 21-year-old Spaniard has played well so far in Paris, but his play was mostly timid. He wasn't hitting his forehand with full power because he was still a little bit worried about his forearm.
He battled a forearm injury the past month, only playing in Madrid ahead of the French Open, and even there, he was quite limited in what he could do. Some analysts who know a thing or two about Alcaraz hypothesized before the event that he would likely not go all out initially due to the forearm issues that plagued him in the past.
It did look that way as the two-time major winner played well, but we didn't really see the devastating forehand in full effect. It appeared against Korda, though, especially on a crucial set point in the second set tie-break, when the Spaniard obliterated a forehand to win the set.
After the match, he confirmed that he was hitting his forehand normally, which is great news for all fans.
"Today, at some point, I forgot about everything and started to hit my forehand normally. More intensity. In the second set tiebreak I hit two forehands and after that I thought ‘wow. I missed this feeling."
While it's great news for tennis fans, it's really bad news for the other players because beating him now becomes much more difficult. Beating him at all is pretty tough, but with his forehand slowly coming together, it's going to be maybe even impossible, especially at Roland Garros.
It should be a spectacular watch, though, as a completely worry-free Alcaraz might be the most electric player we've ever see at least according to Mats Wilander, who is on the ground in Paris with a front-row seat to all of that.
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