ATP Tour

Alcaraz marches past Ruud in Paris, sets Shelton final showdown

Carlos Alcaraz has gone to from the brink of a quarter-final exit to a first Rolex Paris Masters championship match after a whirlwind 24 hours in the French capital.

One day after he saved two match points to survive a three-set epic against Taylor Fritz in the last eight, the second-seeded Alcaraz on Saturday sealed a far-more-straightforward 6-4, 6-4 semi-final triumph against Casper Ruud. The Spaniard did not face a break point in his 86-minute triumph against Ruud, whom he now leads 7-1 in the pair’s Lexus ATP Head2Head series.

With his win against Ruud on Saturday evening, Alcaraz reached the final at a seventh different ATP Masters 1000 event. The 23-year-old has now reached 11 championship matches at Masters 1000 events overall, with only title-match appearances in Canada and Shanghai missing from his collection.

Most ATP Masters 1000 Finals In Series History (Since 1990)

Standing between Alcaraz and the Paris trophy on Sunday will be Ben Shelton, who earlier shook off a slow start to end the run of home hope Luca Van Assche with a 5-7, 6-3, 6-4 victory. Alcaraz leads Shelton 3-1 in the pair’s Lexus ATP Head2Head series: Most recently, Shelton famously outlasted the Spaniard in a five-set thriller at this year’s US Open, while Alcaraz won the two players’ only previous clash indoors, at the 2024 Laver Cup in Berlin.

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Alcaraz maintained a constant level throughout Saturday’s semi-final, rarely offering Ruud any cheap points and breaking through on return once in each set to earn his victory. The Spaniard still sprinkled some trademark moments of magic into his performance — perhaps most notably when he produced an audacious volleyed drop-shot winner early in the second set — but the Spaniard appeared in a businesslike-mood under the Plenitude Arena roof.

Alcaraz finished the match having dropped just nine points on serve, according to Infosys ATP Stats. The former World No. 1, who won an ATP 500 title last week in Vienna, will enter Sunday’s showdown with Shelton on an eight-match winning streak.