The tennis world has welcomed a new star—Carlos Alcaraz. He has made quite the debut into the sport as he has been greatly successful this year. Given his immense success, some critics are even debating whether he’s the “next Rafael Nadal.” Others are wondering if he’ll surpass the famously known Big Three: Novak Djokovic, Roger Federer, and Rafael Nadal. At the rate that he’s going, no one is sure of what he’ll become in the future, but tennis fans knows that he won’t disappoint them. 

Alcaraz is a Spanish tennis player who turned pro in 2018, at the age of 15. In the following years, he earned several impressive achievements. At the age of 18, he reached his first major tournament quarter-final after the upset of Stefanos Tsitsipas, the world No. 3 then. He has also become a champion at the Croatia Open and at the Next Gen ATP Finals. Even with these achievements, his dominance in the sport has mostly started in 2022. Out of his total 51-21 win/loss record, 28 wins and only 3 losses took place this year. In addition, he is currently ranked No. 6 in the world. He broke into the top 10 in his victory against Pablo Carreño Busta in the Barcelona Open finals. It was coincidentally with his current coach, Juan Carlos Ferrero, who Nadal beat in 2005 when he made his entrance into the top 10. Ever since then, Nadal hasn’t exited these elite ranking spots. 

However, these aren’t Alcaraz’s only accomplishments from this year. So far in 2022, the star player has victoriously won the Rio Open, Miami Open, Barcelona Open, and the most impressive one, the Madrid Open. In this tournament win, he defeated the current top three players in the world, and all in a row. He triumphed over Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, and Alexander Zverev in the finals. Thousands of fans were immensely impressed at his performance as he became the youngest champion in the tournament’s history after very few expected a 19-year old to beat these eminent competitors. 

While Nadal and Alcaraz share a common dominance on the clay courts, Nadal has ironically been one of Alcaraz’s idols throughout his childhood. According to the South China Morning Post, “On ATPTour.com, he describes playing against his idol as ‘a dream come true.’” The two players have encountered each other three times already: twice in the Madrid Open and once in the Indian Wells Masters. Even though Nadal was one of the people that Alcaraz knocked out in this year’s Madrid Open, Nadal had done the same to him in the prior year and in the same tournament. It occurred in their first match against each other. 

However, out of Alcaraz’s similarities with some of the tennis legends of today, he has surpassed them and a lot of other players in a significant aspect of the game—the reaching of the first 50 professional wins. He accomplished this task with only twenty losses, a record that all twenty-seven past world No. 1 players in tennis history did not reach. The competitor that was closest to this milestone was Andy Roddick, who had only 22 losses at the time. Alcaraz’s coach, Juan Carlos Ferrero, was also eclipsed by this major achievement as he had played 73 matches when he reached the goal. Surprisingly, even Roger Federer was nowhere near the record since he had 47 losses then. 

Outside of tennis, Alcaraz has also earned many gainings that have derived from his success in the sport. He has received a few highly selective sponsorships such as with Nike, and joined Roger Federer as an ambassador for Rolex. In addition to the abundance of luxuries provided by these brands, his total career earnings are $5,452,072. These winnings are extremely impressive due to the fact that the star is only 19 years old. 

To sum up, Alcaraz has had so far a very promising career but one of the unique facets of tennis is that past successes play no favorable roles in a player’s future competitions. As stated by the Official Site of Men’s Professional Tennis, “It’ll [Carlos Alcaraz] be fun to watch the next few years,’ Gilbert [former World No. 4] said. ‘But the greatness of tennis is that nothing is guaranteed.’” The community of tennis is hopeful for this new star as they hope that he won’t cease to impress them.