Buenos Aires

Jarry stuns Alcaraz to reach Buenos Aires final

Nicolas Jarry claimed the biggest win of his career Saturday, upsetting Carlos Alcaraz 7-6(2), 6-3 in Buenos Aires and extending the Spaniard's title drought to nine tournaments since his Wimbledon triumph last July.

Jarry had taken a set from the 20-year-old in their two prior Lexus ATP Head2Head meetings and showed clear intent to take the fight to the World No. 2 from the outset. The Chilean matched Alcaraz's power from the baseline, made a number of confident net approaches and didn't face a break point in the first set.

After dropping serve at the beginning of the second set, Jarry immediately broke back for 1-1 and then claimed the decisive break in the eighth game.

"Third time lucky," Jarry said of his first win over Alcaraz. "Carlos is one of the best players so it means a lot, especially after the battles I've had a couple of days ago. It's been very tough physically, so I'm very happy to be able to come back.

 

"I didn't start very well and couldn't win points on his serve, but I came back little by little."

 

In a tense final game that featured several breathtaking points, Jarry went down break point when he gambled on a big second serve at 30-all, double faulting for the first time in the match. He later double faulted a second time on match point before soon after closing out the win in one hour, 55 minutes.

Third-seeded Jarry claimed the 100th win of his career in the second round when he rallied to defeat Swiss veteran Stan Wawrinka in a third-set tie-break after the three-time major champion served for the match at 5-4.

 

“It's a difficult defeat, it hurt me a lot,” Alcaraz said. “There are many things to improve, and my level has to go up. I played good tennis but very far from my real level.

“I felt good physically and it's important, and I think that with work I will get better... but having opportunities, is difficult.

“The positive thing is that I see that I have a lot of things to improve. Learning that I have to read the matches better, to give my best version in the moments of tension. Today I lacked that in the 0-30, in the break-points, to be able to play differently there.”

MISSION ACCOMPLISHED 🫡

Nicolas Jarry stuns Alcaraz 7-6(2) 6-3 to make his 6th career tour-level final! @ArgentinaOpen | #IEBMasArgOpen2024 pic.twitter.com/oi1nPtjeco

— ATP Tour (@atptour) February 17, 2024

In Sunday’s final Jarry will play 23-year-old Argentine wild card Facundo Diaz Acosta, who defeated countryman Federico Coria 6-2, 6-3

World No. 87 Diaz Acosta had won just four tour-level matches in his career before this week, including two victories last week en route to the Cordoba Open quarter-finals.

Did You Know?
Jarry has this week climbed back inside the Top 20 of the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings and will move to a career-high No. 17 from his current No. 19 should he win his fourth ATP Tour title.