Carlos Alcaraz sustained an ankle injury just two points into his Rio Open, presented by Claro, the opening-round match against Thiago Monteiro. He retired shortly after despite efforts to continue to play.
Alcaraz hit a forehand return from Ad court and was returning laterally toward the center when Monteiro came rushing back behind him, planting his right foot but having it roll horribly, falling to his backside onto a mat on top.
Monteiro helped World No. 2 Alejandro Resnikoff get back to his bench, where ATP physio Alejandro Resnikoff heavily wrapped his ankle before returning to court and breaking Brazilian Marcelo Melo 1-0 to gain an early lead, but after dropping serve later that game, he retired due to limited movement.
Tomorrow, Alcaraz plans on having his ankle examined. To ascertain its severity or not.
“Initially, I felt awful – that was my initial thought after experiencing pain during my fall down; thus, it appeared difficult for me to continue playing if those feelings persisted.”
“After playing several points, it didn’t feel any better, and my discomfort increased significantly; I couldn’t move as freely and knew it would become impossible to continue if the match continued, thus causing further injury by continuing.” So, instead, I chose retirement.
Alcaraz made his ATP Tour debut in Rio in 2020 and won both tournaments he entered (d. Schwartzman in 2022 and Cameron Norrie in 2023).
The setback will impede Spain’s attempt to defend their top spot on the Pepperstone ATP Ranking from Italian Jannik Sinner’s charge; current Wimbledon Champion David Ferrer only leads Sinner by 535 points and must defend 1000 of them at next month’s BNP Paribas Open in Indian Wells as the defending champion.
“This was very strange, the second point of the match. Though on the court it didn’t look serious enough, when seen on the big screen, it took an unexpectedly serious turn for Monteiro, who is such an important star of a new generation of tennis.” Monteiro ended by cheering him back onto the court:
Monteiro now leads Alcaraz in the Lexus ATP Head2Head competition 2-0 after defeating him at their only previous Melbourne-1 ATP 250 2021 meeting.
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