It is crunch time in the men’s French Open 2024 with two blockbuster semi-finals on the cards on Friday. First up is a battle between third and second seeds Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner before Casper Ruud clashes with Alexander Zverev in a repeat of last year’s semi-final.
French Open 2024: Sinner should show up against Alcaraz
Carlos Alcaraz’s two Grand Slam titles to date both came on the faster surfaces at Wimbledon and the US Open but the Spaniard has long looked primed for major glory on the Parisian clay. Preparations for this year’s event did not go well as Alcaraz was limited to an appearance at the Madrid Open, reaching the quarter-finals, during the European clay-court season.
He missed both the Barcelona Open and Monte-Carlo Masters but he has looked anything but rusty at Roland Garros, dropping just one set across his five wins. The straight-sets demolition of Stefanos Tsitsipas in the quarter-finals was impressive but in Jannik Sinner, Alcaraz is about to face his toughest challenge yet.
Sinner had his own injury concerns coming into this Grand Slam but has also shaken them off and has also dropped just the one set en route to the semi-finals. In 2024, he has been spectacular, winning 28 of his 30 matches and claiming three titles in the process, including the Australian Open at the start of the season. Therefore, there is very little between these players and Sinner, who is the bigger price, is the one to back.
French Open 2024: Ruud to book another final appearance
The match odds are even closer in the other French Open 2024 semi-final between Casper Ruud and Alexander Zverev and the outsider Ruud is again the one to back. Zverev was touted as a dark horse for the French Open title this summer and rightly so, but Ruud has been a little overlooked.
That is despite the fact Ruud has reached the final of the French Open in the last two seasons, while 17 of the 23 finals he has competed in have been on clay. He also has a 100 per cent record in Grand Slam semi-finals, winning all three he has been in, and has the slight edge over Zverev when it comes to recent meetings.
The head-to-head between the players stands at 2-2 but the last two encounters have both gone the way of Ruud, including a clash in the semi-finals of the French Open last year. Zverev has excelled on clay this year but he was taken to five sets in both the third and fourth rounds of the French Open.
Ruud, meanwhile, was able to have a breather after Novak Djokovic withdrew before their quarter-final, giving the Norwegian a bye into the last four. He can make that extra rest count by beating German Zverev and securing a spot in the final. A huge opportunity awaits all four men, with Novak Dkovoic struggling with injury and now unlikely to be fit for a return at Wimbledon next month at SW19.
French Open 2024: men’s semi-finals tips
Jannik Sinner to beat Carlos Alcaraz @ 2.25
Casper Ruud to beat Alexander Zverev @ 1.88 with kwiff
By Liam Flin
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