Defending champ Alcaraz opens Centre Court play in style at Wimbledon

pDefending a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/wimbledon/540/overview'Wimbledon/a champion a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/carlos-alcaraz/a0e2/overview'Carlos Alcaraz/a was pushed by Estonian qualifier a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/mark-lajal/l0gh/overview'Mark Lajal/a on Monday, but found a way through in straight sets to ensure his title defence started in perfect fashion at The Championships./p

pThe 21-year-old withstood a free-hitting, aggressive performance from Lajal to record a 7-6(3), 7-5, 6-2 victory at the grass-court major./p

p"He surprised me a little bit because I had not seen him play too much," Alcaraz said. "He is very young, he is my age. I am sure I am going to see him on the Tour and play him more often. I am really happy to get through and get my first win on Centre Court this year."/p

blockquote class="twitter-tweet"p lang="en" dir="ltr"Roaring on Centre Court ????a href="https://twitter.com/carlosalcaraz?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@carlosalcaraz/a downs Lajal 7-6(3) 7-5 6-2 to continue his title defence!a href="https://twitter.com/a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/wimbledon/540/overview'Wimbledon/a?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"@Wimbledon/a | a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/wimbledon/540/overview'Wimbledon/a?src=hashamp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"#Wimbledon/a a href="https://t.co/UWY0Zg4bbh"pic.twitter.com/UWY0Zg4bbh/a/pmdash; ATP Tour (@atptour) a href="https://twitter.com/atptour/status/1807791243302216045?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw"July 1, 2024/a/blockquote script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"/script

pOpening play on Centre Court as the defending champion, Alcaraz looked comfortable for large periods in an environment in which he holds fond memories. The Spaniard toppled a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/novak-djokovic/d643/overview'Novak Djokovic/a in five sets in the championship match last year to win his first a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/wimbledon/540/overview'Wimbledon/a title and looked in relaxed spirits when walking onto court for his first Lexus ATP Head2Head meeting with Lajal./p

pIn a two-hour, 22-minute battle, Alcaraz used his feathered drop shot to great effect, while he treated the packed crowd to a number of explosive groundstrokes to set a second-round meeting with Mallorca finalist a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/sebastian-ofner/o513/overview'Sebastian Ofner/a or Australian a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/aleksandar-vukic/v832/overview'Aleksandar Vukic/a./p

p"Stepping onto this court at a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/wimbledon/540/overview'Wimbledon/a is the most beautiful court that I have played on. I am still nervous when I play here," Alcaraz said. "I practised for 45 minutes on Thursday and it was the first time I have been nervous in practise and it is because it is for playing here."/p

[ATP APP]

pThe No. 3 in the PIF ATP Rankings became the youngest player in history to win a major on all three surfaces when he triumphed at a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/roland-garros/520/overview'Roland Garros/a last month. Alcaraz then won his opening grass-court match of the year against a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/francisco-cerundolo/c0au/overview'Francisco Cerundolo/a at Queenrsquo;s before British No. 1 a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/jack-draper/d0co/overview'Jack Draper/a upset him in the second round./p

pThe Spaniard put any grass-court doubts to bed against Lajal, though, hitting 43 winners to extend his perfect record to 7-0 against qualifiers at majors./p

pLajal is No. 269 in the PIF ATP Rankings but produced an impressive display on his Grand Slam debut. The 21-year-old, a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://www.atptour.com/en/news/lajal-wimbledon-2024-feature" target="_blank"who admitted he started screaming/a after hearing he drew Alcaraz in the first round, was just the fifth man from Estonia to play at a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/tournaments/wimbledon/540/overview'Wimbledon/a./p

pAlcaraz would play a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/borna-coric/cg80/overview'Borna Coric/a or a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/frances-tiafoe/td51/overview'Frances Tiafoe/a in the third round if he advances in round two. Croatian Coric beat Brazilian qualifier a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/felipe-meligeni-alves/mw75/overview'Felipe Meligeni Alves/a 6-3, 7-6(2), 6-3, while Tiafoe earned a thrilling 6-7(5), 2-6, 6-1, 6-3, 6-3 comeback win against a href='https://www.atptour.com/en/players/matteo-arnaldi/a0fc/overview'Matteo Arnaldi/a. It is the first time the American has rallied from two-sets-to-love down in his career./p

p[NEWSLETTER FORM]/p