The number two in world tennis, the Spanish Carlos Alcaraz, progressed this Monday to the round of 16 of the Shanghai Masters after beating the British Daniel Evans in two sets, 7-6 (1) and 6-4.
The match was settled in 2 hours and 23 minutes, and offered some points of true spectacle that were rightly recognized with thunderous applause by the public on the main court of the Qizhong sports center.
Specifically, in the fifth game of the first set, Evans ended up crashing into the net after brilliantly saving an equally meritorious drop shot from Alcaraz to avoid the Spaniard's advantage. Until that moment, the Englishman had saved eight breaking points, putting himself ahead 1-4.
Alcaraz, although he missed some theoretically easy shots, little by little he found his tennis to force a 'tie break' in which he was imperial - Evans only managed one point - and took the first set.
In the second set, Evans, 33rd in the world ranking, put Alcaraz in trouble again by going 4-4, but the Spaniard did not hesitate and closed his victory to the rest with a great setback.
Alcaraz and Evans had already faced each other three times, all of them with favorable results for the Spaniard, the last one at the United States Open (6-2, 6-3, 4-6, 6-3) last September. .
After passing this phase, the top seed in Shanghai will have to face the Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov in the next round, ranked 19th in the world rankings, after he beat the Russian Karen Khachanov 7-6 (6) and 6-4.
