Newly crowned ATP Next Gen World Tour Finals champion Carlos Alcaraz has hailed the use of innovative rules at the tournament but there is one particular format he is not a fan of.
The annual event features the eight highest-ranked players on the ATP Tour under the age of 21. It is known for its trialing of new rules which may be implemented on the Tour in the future. This year’s edition includes initiatives such as courtside coaching, time toilet breaks and a limit to how many medical timeouts a player can take during matches.
Another rule this year was the shortening of players’ warm-ups from four minutes to just one minute. Organisers describe the initiative as ‘less down time, more action’ meaning there is less time between the players entering the court and the match beginning. However, 18-year-old Alcaraz believes a 60-second warm-up doesn’t give players enough time to prepare for the match.
“The one minute of warm-up, you have no time to warm up. I would say for the player, you can’t warm up everything, every shot, the volley, the serve, the backhand, the forehand, at all,” he told reporters on Saturday.
“I would say that you have to warm up four minutes to play forehands, backhands, volley, serve, smash, everything to start the match in the best way possible.’
“There are some rules that I would keep and there are some other rules that I don’t really like.” He added.
At the Next Gen Finals players did have the opportunity to warm-up for an extra minute if they wanted to. After their initial 60-second hit, the organisers allowed an additional minute before the match where they can return to their chair ahead of the match starting. During that time, they were allowed to continue practicing if they wanted to.
Alcaraz lifted the title on Saturday with a straight sets win over Sebastian Korda. Following in the footsteps of Stefanos Tsitsipas and Jannik Sinner who have also previously won the title. He dropped just one set in the tournament which was against Juan Manuel Cerúndolo during the round-robin stages.
“I feel amazing. It’s pretty good to end the year in the best way possible, winning this title, playing great matches against great players. I mean, it’s the best way to finish the year.” Alcaraz said.
At 32nd in the world rankings, Alcaraz is the youngest player currently inside the top 100 on the men’s Tour. Earlier this year he won his maiden title at the Umag Open. Becoming the youngest player to win an ATP trophy since Kei Nishikori back in 2008 and the youngest Spaniard to do so since Rafael Nadal in 2004. He also reached his first Grand Slam quarter-final at the US Open where he defeated Stefanos Tsitsipas en route to the last eight.
“I think this experience wouldn’t be possible without the experience that I got in other tournaments like Madrid, playing against Rafa, in Acapulco playing against Zverev,” Alcaraz reflected. “There are a lot of tournaments, matches that I played that gave me a lot of experience to be able to get more mature so soon.’
“I’m really happy for the season and the moments that I did.”
Alcaraz is the youngest player to win 30 or more ATP matches in a season since Andrei Medvedev back in 1992.
