Carlos Alcaraz has reached the Cincinnati Open final…

The 22-year-old Spanish professional tennis player defeated Alexander Zverev 6-4, 6-3 in the semifinals on Saturday night to advance to the title match.

“It’s never easy playing against someone you know is not 100 percent,” said Alcaraz after his victory.

After seeing what happened to Alcaraz early in the second set, those words may sound like something of an understatement.

With Alcaraz up a set and serving at 1-0 in the second, Zverev stopped moving for anything that was more than a step away from him. He let one groundstroke go by, and waved at a serve while holding his racquet in his left hand. Alcaraz was up 40-15, and the air had gone out of the arena, as Zverev looked ready to wave the white flag.

Somehow, Alcaraz found a way to keep Zverev in it for longer than seemed possible, or healthy for the German.

Alcaraz double faulted four times in that game alone, and sent a forehand long at break point. Zverev was alive, and a few minutes later Alcaraz was letting out a scream of disbelief.

“All of a sudden he started feeling really bad,” Alcaraz said. “And then my focus, I started thinking about how he’s feeling, besides focusing on myself and playing good tennis.”

All’s well that ends well, of course, for Alcaraz. In this case, all’s well that starts well, too. The first set was a good one from both guys, with sharp, all-court rallies and a mix of power and touch. Most promising for Alcaraz was the way he dug himself out of a 0-40 hold at 2-3, and then turned around and broke serve at 3-3. He saved two of those break points with deft forehand drop shots, and broke Zverev by sticking a crosscourt backhand volley a foot from the sideline. From there, Alcaraz’s serve started to click, and he finished with 11 aces in nine service games.

“We started the match really good, good rallies, good level of tennis,” Alcaraz said, lamenting the fact that it didn’t stay that way.

While Zverev made the semifinal at a Masters 1000 this week, his physical state is concerning going into the US Open. This was the second straight night where he struggled to breathe and move, sweated much more than is normal for him, and was forced to call the doctor onto the court. It has been hot and humid in Cincinnati, but he played both of those matches in the evening, when the worst of the weather had past.

If Zverev is already thinking of New York, Alcaraz has one more piece of business to attend to in Cincinnati. A pretty big piece of business, in fact: Another final with Jannik Sinner, their fourth of 2025.

What can he take from Saturday’s semi into Monday’s final? On the plus side, he can be hopeful about his serve, and how much it can help him on these fast courts. On the minus side, he showed signs against Zverev that a second-set letdown was coming, something that had already happened to him twice here. Who knows how the set would have played out if Zverev had been healthy.

But all of that is in the past, and now Alcaraz and Sinner can ascend into their private stratosphere, with the sports world as happy spectators again. Alcaraz, who is coming off a loss to Sinner at Wimbledon last month, sounds like he’s not going to settle for anything less than his best this time around.

“We really bring out beautiful tennis,” Alcaraz said of their Top 2 rivalry. “I’m ready for the challenge. Just to be ready and perfect.”