As if it blended into the grass from day to night, carlos alcaraz Overcoming his fear of his surface debut, he tipped the Czech Jiri Lehecka (6-2 and 6-3) and in the quarterfinals of a tournament on this surface for the first time in his career.

At Queen’s, a tournament where Alcaraz misses being on the wall of champions, Murcian took a menacing step this Thursday. Against a much more relaxed opponent than host Arthur Rinderknech, He got rid of the troubles of the first day and played a clean, aggressive and dominant game..

Lehecka, a year and a half older than Alcaraz and blasting this course with rooms in Australia and Doha, Much easier hunting than Rinderknech. He lacks French service, offensive play, and unpredictability. He tried to compete with the Spaniards from the bottom and the net with a few points and had nothing to gain there.

from El Palmar, First date anxiety goneIt was much more relaxed, calmer. He came up with the idea of ​​domination and It didn’t take long for them to take a 3-0 lead.. Only two double mistakes in a row spoiled the first shot. Lehecka was condemned to suffer, to wait for the crumbs of the Spaniard, who was faced with a full track and was aware of the diamond in front of them and did not take long to wrap it.

The cyclone drawn to the right passed over the Czech who could not draw anything. Accepted his serve twice and no ‘break’ ball was produced. The show didn’t go any further because the two drop shots Alcaraz tried got stuck on the ropes. Its high point was a sliced ​​ball that was launched deep into midfield from the front, giving another nod to Roger Federer, the master of that shot.

When the first set was fixed, Alcaraz didn’t want to be scared, he wanted more. He won ten of the first thirteen points of the second quarter and left two consecutive ‘passes’ for the retina. In Lehecka’s serve, a forehand and a backhand.

The 3-0 win lifted the Czech Republic, He said he had two games to return to the game. He held his serve comfortably at first and then tested the break. There were three broken balls in a game that lasted more than ten minutes, but Alcaraz let out another dose of pain and surprises.

If Alcaraz claims after the duel with Rinderknech that they don’t have high expectations for this tournament, the pools now take him more into account. His tennis has already adapted to the grass. and whether anyone can solve it and put an end to it is one of the biggest puzzles of the week at Queen’s.

His next opponent will be Argentina’s Francisco Cerúndolo.Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov, who has already won a training set this week or beaten a little over a month ago at the Masters 1000 in Madrid.