Wimbledon 2023: Alcaraz dismantles Rune, Jabeur completes revenge mission to reach semi-finals
World number one Carlos Alcaraz came up trumps in the battle of the 20-year-olds with Holger Rune to reach his first-ever Wimbledon semi-final on Centre Court.
The Spaniard – who was born just six days after his Danish counterpart – demonstrated a masterclass in clean ball-striking to get the job done in straight sets, prevailing 7-6[3] 6-4 6-4.
Rune brought up the first and only break point of the first set in the opening game, but Alcaraz crucially saved it before taking the lead on a dominant tie-breaker.
Rune’s loss of serve in ninth game of the second set preceded a comfortable hold for Alcaraz, who also needed just the one break in the third before advancing on his fourth match point, as Rune could only send a forehand beyond the baseline.
Standing in the way of Alcaraz and a maiden Wimbledon final will be Russian third seed Daniil Medvedev, who ended Christopher Eubanks’s inspirational run with an enthralling five-set success.
The unseeded Eubanks managed to glean a 2-1 lead over Medvedev, but the former US Open champion fought back with aplomb to prevail 6-4 1-6 4-6 7-6[4] 6-1.
From hitting 16 winners in the opening set to just 14 across the second and third combined, Medvedev’s game dropped dramatically midway through the contest, while the big-hitting Eubanks forced the Russian into errors.
Neither player managed to fashion a single break point in the third set, but Medvedev edged the tie-breaker before Eubanks ceded an early break in the fifth with a double fault – one which he would not recover from.
Medvedev proceeded to dictate play and won the first four games of the fifth before Eubanks registered, but the American fan favourite could not spark a tremendous turnaround and bowed out to a standing ovation from the crowd.
Meanwhile, a repeat of last year’s women’s singles final saw Ons Jabeur complete her revenge mission over defending champion Elena Rybakina, coming from a set down to knock out the holder 6-7[7] 6-4 6-1.
Rybakina broke Jabeur as the Tunisian was serving for the first set before coming up with the goods in the tie-breaker, but Jabeur responded in the second with a succession of forehand winners in the 10th game to take the contest to the distance.
A third-set collapse from Rybakina saw the defending champion land just 28% of her first serves, and Jabeur capitalised in ruthless fashion to set up a tantalising battle with Belarus’ Aryna Sabalenka.
The Australian Open champion’s success over Madison Keys of the USA was much more straightforward by comparison, as she comfortably dispatched the Eastbourne champion 6-2 6-4 in under an hour and a half.
Sabalenka hit just five unforced errors in a strong opening set, but Keys made things interesting with a break in the sixth game of the second set, building up a 4-2 lead in the process.
However, Sabalenka rose to the challenge and powered her way through a four-game winning streak to reach her fourth successive Grand Slam quarter-final.
