In the final of the prestigious Masters series tennis tournament in Cincinnati, USA, the past and future of tennis came together: Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz. It is true that the Serb still has no intention of handing over the throne to the young man, and the Spaniard is so dispersed that he does not intend to wait for anything else. Spectators who flocked to the stadium on Sunday night witnessed a battle for history.
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Djokovic was considered a notable pre-match favorite and quickly began to confirm his status: in the sixth game, he brought the opponent’s serve to nil, dragged Alcaraz at break point around the court and finished it all off with a beautiful kick from knock out. True, the Spaniard immediately returned the missed shot. Then Carlos again imposed a stubborn struggle on the opponent’s serve with a score of 4: 4, but still he could not break. Novak seemed to be saved, but not for long: after a couple of games, the Spaniard, having missed two break points at the start, delivered the decisive blow in the first set – 7:5.
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At the beginning of the second installment, Alcaraz led with a 3-1 break. At that time, it seemed to many that now such a teacher would bring the matter to its logical conclusion. But Djokovic had his own opinion on this matter. In the eighth game, he hits a reverse break. Until the end of the set, the tennis players did not take other people’s feeds. In the tiebreaker, the Spaniard set up a match point for himself, however, on the opponent’s serve, so there was no real chance of reaching it in the end. In the end, a nervous game began, in which the Serb turned out to be better: on the decisive balls, the opponent hit the net twice.
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In the final third set, Djokovic took the seventh most difficult game on someone else’s serve, and then was able to end the match twice on another opponent’s serve. However, Alcaraz persevered and at the last moment in another crazy game he returned the pitch and left with two more match balls. True, he almost immediately again almost left the field of play, but he managed to survive and take the matter to the next tiebreaker.
And there again, a little stronger, a little more precise, a little more patient turned out to be Djokovic, who won the 95th title in his career and the 39th directly at the Masters. Now Nola is one step closer to Jimmy Connors’ record of 109 tournament wins. Immediately afterwards, the Serb, in a fit of emotion, tore his shirt at chest height, and Alcaraz was so upset that he burst into tears on the pitch.
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It is clear that the duration of the match itself does not always indicate its quality. But in this case, both players showed an excellent game, gave the audience absolutely crazy and insane intrigue and fighting. That is why the last final will remain in memory, and 3 hours and 50 minutes are just numbers for the pages of history.
