Another potential Novak Djokovic and Carlos Alcaraz showdown is at stake in Paris.
On Friday morning, Alcaraz secured his spot for the men’s singles final after defeating Felix Auger-Aliassime 6-1, 6-1 in the semifinals.
Alcaraz, 21, could become the youngest man to win an Olympics tennis singles gold medal Sunday morning, as he is only a month younger than American Vincent Richards was when he claimed the gold in Paris in 1924.
A rematch with Djokovic will happen should the Serbian win his semifinal match Friday against Italy’s Lorenzo Musetti, whom he beat in the semifinals at Wimbledon.
“I played at a very high level from the beginning to the end,” Alcaraz told Eurosport’s Alex Corretja on court, per Reuters. “One of my objectives at the beginning of the year was to win a gold medal and now we have this one match to try to get it and I am going to have fun.
“It’s a very important moment for my team, my family and the Spanish people and I want to do the business.”
A Wimbledon rematch is at stake less than a month after the Spaniard showed his young prowess to get the better of Djokovic in England.
Alcaraz cruised through the first two sets against Djokovic on grass, taking each set 6-2, proving the match to be much easier for him than past meetings.
However, he did stumble in the third set and almost gave up a comeback in a tiebreaker set.
“It was difficult for me,” said Alcaraz, who owns four Grand Slam titles including a recent victory on clay at Roland Garros in June, after the Wimbledon match. “I tried to stay calm. I tried to stay positive.”
A rematch is not a foregone conclusion, though.
It’s not exactly clear how healthy Djokovic is after he endured a “sharp pain” in his surgically repaired right knee while fighting to defeat Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas in the quarterfinals Thursday.
He underwent surgery to fix the torn meniscus in June and was forced to withdraw before his Roland Garros quarterfinal match during the French Open.
“I dug deep and found a way,” Djokovic said on Thursday, per ATP. “Really glad that I managed to win the match. I had a scare early in the second set with the knee, kind of a deja vu from what happened a few months ago at Roland Garros, where I injured myself in a match, managed to finish the match victorious, but only to find out the next day that I tore my meniscus.
“So I’m hoping that’s not the case this time. I don’t know. I’m honestly concerned, but I’m going to let the medical team evaluate the knee, do examination. Tomorrow night I think I’m playing a night match at seven, so I have some time to recover and get ready. Hopefully I’ll be able to be physically fit for the semis.”
In his semifinal match, Alcaraz never faced a point break and had the crowd at Court Philippe Chatrier rallied around him, waving Spanish flags and cheering “Vamos, Carlos!”
“I just couldn’t find a way to be comfortable in any pattern, any position. Whether it was trying to dominate the forehand cross-court or change of direction, the forehand inside-out, the backhand side,” Auger-Aliassime said after his loss. “Every aspect. The movement. The defense. I was dominated.”