Alcaraz with a strong start against Shevchenko in Madrid

Defending champion and second seed Carlos Alcaraz (Spain) qualified for the third round of the clay tennis tournament of the “Masters” series in the Spanish capital Madrid with a prize fund of 7,877,020 euros. Two-time top seed Alcaraz overcame Alexander Shevchenko of Kazakhstan 6-2, 6-1 in just 69 minutes in the second round despite concerns about his physical condition.

Carlos Alcaraz got off to a solid start and led 4-1 after two breaks before closing out the first set 6-2. The Spaniard started the second part with a streak of three games in a row, and Shevchenko won only one before the final 6:1 in favor of Alcaraz.

In the third round, the Spanish tennis player will meet Thiago Seibot Wild (Brazil), who eliminated the 28th-ranked Italian after winning 6:4, 6:4 in an hour and 29 minutes of play.

Seventh-seeded Andrei Rublev of Russia snapped his four-game losing streak with a 6-1, 6-4 win over Argentina’s Facundo Bagnis to set up a showdown against 27th-ranked Alejandro Davidovich Fokina. The Spaniard eliminated the representative of China Junchen Shan 7:5, 6:3. The match lasted an hour and 44 minutes.

Poland’s Huber Hurkach, seeded eighth, also secured a place in the third round after beating Great Britain’s Jack Draper 6-1, 7-5. His next opponent will be the German Daniel Altmaier, who beat the 31st ranked Frenchman Arthur Fiess 6:2, 6:3.

15th seed Tommy Paul (USA) prevailed in the second round over Lukasz Klein of Slovakia 6-7(5), 6-1, 6-4 in his first clay-court match of the season and will play the 21st in the Francisco Cherundolo scheme. The Argentinian tennis player beat Hungarian Fabian Marozhan 6:2, 7:6(5).

Also in a match of the second round, the representative of Canada, Denis Shapovalov, defeated the 26th-ranked Argentine, Thomas Martin Echeverri, 7:6(3), 6:3.