World number one Carlos Alcaraz was knocked out of the Miami Open in the third round after a surprise 6-3 5-7 6-4 defeat by Sebastian Korda.<\/p>\n
Top seed Alcaraz, 22, produced a sloppy first set which gave the American the early initiative but Korda looked to have blown his chance in the second set.<\/p>\n
Korda served for the match at 5-4 but was broken to love by the Spaniard who went on to win the next two games to force a third set.<\/p>\n
Alcaraz upped the ante but Korda held his nerve and seized a break for 4-3 in the third when his opponent stroked a forehand wide.<\/p>\n
Korda, ranked 36th in the world, confidently held his next two service games to close out the match – sealing the win on his second match point as Alcaraz overhit a a return.<\/p>\n
Alcaraz said his game is improving despite being knocked out as he prepares to rest up before the clay-court seaon.<\/p>\n
“I think the process has been good. Besides the loss today, I think I’m still in the right way,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Some things in previous tournaments that I just didn’t feel comfortable, I think in this tournament, I started to feel better and better.”<\/p>\n
Alcaraz said lower-ranked opponents such as Korda have the opportunity to play with more freedom against him, but he must guard against putting undue pressure on himself.<\/p>\n
He added: “I’m feeling they have more to win than to lose in those matches. They’re playing without pressure.<\/p>\n
“I’m not thinking about my pressure. I don’t feel it at all. I’m trying to play my best.”<\/p>\n
Korda, 25, is the lowest-ranked man to defeat Alcaraz since world number 55 David Goffin of Belgium upset the Spaniard in the second round in Miami last year<\/p>\n
Alcaraz began the year by winning his seventh Grand Slam title with a triumph at the Australian Open and did not suffer his first loss of the season until he fell to Daniil Medvedev in the semi-finals of Indian Wells.<\/p>\n
Korda, who reached the quarter-finals of the Miami Open in 2021 and 2025 but has never gone further, will face 14th seed Karen Khachanov or qualifier Martin Landaluce in the fourth round.<\/p>\n
“It feels great,” said Korda, who wrapped up the win in two hours and 19 minutes as he beat a top-ranked player for the first time in his career. <\/p>\n
“I took the scenic route, that’s for sure – a little more stress than I would want but happy with how I played.<\/p>\n
“I kept believing. I got myself in some nasty situations, but I kept going and played really well in the end.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"World number one Carlos Alcaraz was knocked out of the Miami Open in the third round after a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539619,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[72],"tags":[99,428],"class_list":["post-539618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=539618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539618\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539619"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}