MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) \u2014 Alexander Zverev vented angrily on the court when Carlos Alcaraz was given a medical timeout in the third set of their Australian Open semifinal, and he didn\u2019t backtrack on his opinion after losing an epic five-setter that lasted nearly 5 1\/2 hours.<\/p>\n
Zverev had first say in the semifinal post-match news conferences Friday, repeating more or less what he told a tournament supervisor on the court: He believed Alcaraz had cramps and it wasn\u2019t cause for a medical timeout.<\/p>\n
\u201cNormally you can\u2019t take a medical timeout for cramping\u201d he said after the longest semifinal ever at the Australian Open. \u201cWhat can I do? It\u2019s not my decision. I didn\u2019t like it, but it\u2019s not my decision.\u201d<\/p>\n
Alcaraz arrived for his official news conference around two hours later and said he needed an assessment because the pain was very localized. That\u2019s within the rules.<\/p>\n
The 22-year-old Spaniard said he\u2019d experienced cramps before but this felt different because it \u201cwas on a specific just one muscle, so I didn\u2019t think (it) was cramp at all at the beginning.\u201d <\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t particularly hot by Melbourne standards, the afternoon match starting in temperatures close to 30 degrees Celsius (86 Fahrenheit) but dropping to around 27 Celsius (80F) when Alcaraz started to struggle around 2 hours, 40 minutes into the match.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I didn\u2019t know exactly what it was, because I just go around to a forehand and then I started to feel it just in the right adductor,\u201d he said. \u201cThat\u2019s why I just called the physio, because it was just that moment.\u201d <\/p>\n
He said his left leg was fine at the time.<\/p>\n
Timing<\/p>\n
It all started in the ninth game of the third set \u2014 with Alcaraz two sets up \u2014 when he started limping and appeared to be struggling with an upper right leg problem. <\/p>\n
After holding for 5-4, he took a medical timeout in the changeover. He rubbed the inside of his right thigh and called for the trainer, who also massaged the same area.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith all the stress that I didn\u2019t know what\u2019s going on, didn\u2019t know if it\u2019s going to be worse or not, it came everything after all,\u201d Alcaraz said. \u201cIn that moment I just talked to the physio. … He decided to take the medical timeout.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even with his limited footwork, Alcaraz was able to hit winners and get to 6-5 before the trainer returned in the changeover to massage the area again.<\/p>\n
When he went back out, the crowd gave him rousing support. Zverev served a double-fault to open the next game, and Alcaraz lobbed and then slapped a forehand winner down the line to get to 0-30, getting within two points of victory. But Zverev won four straight points to force the tiebreaker and then win it.<\/p>\n
The No. 3-seeded Zverev said that while he won the next two sets, he missed a chance to win them quicker and reserve energy for the fifth.<\/p>\n
\u201cUnbelievable fight, battle. Unfortunate ending for me, but to be honest, I had absolutely nothing left in me,\u201d he said. \u201cNormally I can rely on my serve a bit more. My legs stopped pushing upward, so yeah, that\u2019s the way it is. This is life. We move on.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cramps<\/p>\n
The issue of timing for rule interventions has caused wide public debate since the tournament\u2019s extreme heat policy was activated while two-time defending champion Jannik Sinner was struggling with cramps in his third-round match. After a break for the roof to be closed, Sinner returned with way more energy and rallied to win.<\/p>\n
There was plenty of online speculation about the medical timeout, too. But Zverev thought it was time to let it go.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo be honest, I don\u2019t want to talk about this right now, because I think this is one of the best battles there ever was in Australia,\u201d he said. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t deserve to be the topic now.\u201d<\/p>\n
___<\/p>\n
AP tennis: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/tennis<\/p>\n
John Pye, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) \u2014 Alexander Zverev vented angrily on the court when Carlos Alcaraz was given a medical…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":443169,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-443168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=443168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/443168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/443169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=443168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=443168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=443168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}