SHOW OF FORCE

PARIS, France (AFP) — Carlos Alcaraz produced his best display of the tournament to book a quarterfinal rematch with Stefanos Tsitsipas at the French Open, while Iga Swiatek ramped up her bid for a third successive Roland Garros title with a 40-minute blitz on Sunday.

Alcaraz said he feels much more like himself in Paris after an injury-hit build-up saw him sidelined by a sore forearm for almost a month.

His 6-3, 6-3, 6-1 win over Canadian 21st seed Felix Auger-Aliassime suggested he is rounding into top form, sending an ominous signal to his rivals as he made the Last Eight for the third year in succession.

The Spaniard pumped 34 winners past Auger-Aliassime as the persistent rain which heavily disrupted the first week of the tournament finally relented, allowing matches on the two main courts to go ahead without the need for their retractable roofs. 

“I’m really happy with my performance. I think I played a really high level of tennis,” said Alcaraz, beaten by eventual champion Novak Djokovic in the semifinals last year.

“The most important thing is to believe in myself. It doesn’t matter that I don’t have too many matches on my back and that I didn’t come with a lot of rhythm.”

“My game is getting better and better,” he added. 

“My confidence is getting higher. Every practice that I’m doing or every day that I’m here in Roland Garros, I’m feeling better and better.”

Alcaraz moves on to play Tsitsipas after the 2021 Roland Garros runner-up fended off Italy’s Matteo Arnaldi 3-6, 7-6 (7/4), 6-2, 6-2, the turning point coming in the second set when he saved four set points.

“It was one of the craziest comebacks I’ve had,” ninth seed Tsitsipas said. 

‘The most important thing is to believe in myself.’

“That game when I broke (down 5-3 in the second set) was the biggest pleasure I’ve experienced in tennis for a long time.”

Alcaraz boasts a 5-0 career head-to-head record over Tsitsipas with three wins on clay, including a straight-sets victory in the French Open quarter-finals a year ago.

“He has said in the past he likes playing against me, so I hope he gets to like it a little bit less this time,” Tsitsipas said.

Second seed Jannik Sinner dropped his first set of the tournament but recovered to end French interest in the men’s draw, putting out Corentin Moutet 2-6, 6-3, 6-2, 6-1 in the night match.

Australian Open champion Sinner stumbled out of the gate and lost the first five games against an inspired Moutet, who was trying to reach a first Grand Slam quarter-final at the age of 25.

But Sinner, who has lost only two matches this year and will replace Djokovic as world No. 1 if he reaches the final, steadied himself to nullify the threat of the 79th-ranked Moutet.

“It was very tough for me. I think he played very, very well in the first set, so I had to adjust a little bit,” Sinner said. 

He is through to a seventh Grand Slam quarterfinal, the most by an Italian man in the Open era.

Sinner next faces Grigor Dimitrov, who defeated Hubert Hurkacz in straight sets to complete a set of Grand Slam quarterfinals. The Bulgarian has reached the last four of the other three majors but never made it to a final.

Earlier in the day, women’s world number one Swiatek demolished Russia’s Anastasia Potapova 6-0, 6-0, conceding only 10 points in the shortest completed match of her career.

“I was really focused and in the zone. I wasn’t looking at the score so I continued working on my game,” Swiatek said.

“It went pretty quickly — pretty weird.”