Former champion Carlos Alcaraz has been sent packing from US Open 2024 round two in straight sets by Dutch player Botic van de Zandschulp.
Dutch tennis star Botic van de Zandschulp caused a massive upset in the second round of the ongoing US Open 2024, when he sent former champion Carlos Alcaraz packing in straight sets in round two on Thursday (August 29) night. Van de Zandschulp defeated Alcaraz 6-1, 7-5, 6-4 to cause a massive upset against the third seed.
Alcaraz has won the French Open 2024, Wimbledon 2024 and a silver medal at the Paris Olympics 2024 this year alone. But was stunned by this unknown name from the Netherlands in two hours and 19 minutes contest.
WATCH Botic van de Zandschulp stun Carlos Alcaraz at US Open 2024 HERE…
Botic van de Zandschulp just knocked Carlos Alcaraz out of the US Open! pic.twitter.com/QK3ZrkoPgx
— US Open Tennis (@usopen) August 30, 2024
The Spanish star was steamrolled in the first set and finally earned a break in the second set, but was broken twice to go two sets down in the match. The youngster, thereafter, took a short break to gather himself but that did not work out as Van de Zandschulp earned an early break to go 3-2 up.
Carlos Alcaraz’s 15-match Grand Slam unbeaten run ended at the US Open 2024. It was as hard one to predict, given Alcaraz’s standing in the game, his excellence of late and his opponent’s far-lesser resume.
Alcaraz won the French Open in June and Wimbledon in July to raise his career total to four major championships, including taking the title at Flushing Meadows in 2022. But he never found his footing against Van de Zandschulp, a 28-year-old from the Netherlands. Alcaraz was way off, repeatedly missing the sorts of shots he usually makes routinely. After double-faulting to fall behind two sets to none — a deficit he’s never overcome — the No. 3-seeded Alcaraz slung his equipment bag over this shoulder and trudged toward the locker room.
Glancing in the direction of his coach, 2003 French Open champion Juan Carlos Ferrero, Alcaraz pointed his right index finger at his temple, then wagged that finger, as if to say, “I’m not thinking straight.”
He might have been excused for being confused by what was transpiring under the closed retractable roof at Arthur Ashe Stadium on a chilly evening. The 21-year-old from Spain came in with a 16-2 record at the U.S. Open, where he never lost before the quarterfinals in three previous appearances. This also was Alcaraz’s earliest defeat at any major tournament since bowing out in the second round of Wimbledon in 2021 as a teenager; he’s never lost in the first round at a Slam event.
In contrast, Van de Zandschulp only once has been to a Grand Slam quarterfinal, getting that far at the US Open in 2021.
Otherwise, though, he is not someone most folks would have expected to pull of this sort of monumental upset. Consider: Van de Zandschulp was just 11-18 for the season at the start of this week and hadn’t won consecutive matches at a tour-level event in 2024.
“Actually, I am a little bit at a loss for words,” he said. “It’s been an incredible evening for me.”
(with AP inputs)