Alex de Minaur’s vow falls flat against world No.1 Carlos Alcaraz at ATP Finals

Alex de Minaur had vowed to do some damage at the ATP Finals but his promise came to little on the opening day of the end-of-season championships in Turin as Carlos Alcaraz proved the bulldozer of the Australian’s dreams.

De Minaur, in his second straight crack at the end-of-season men’s championship featuring the world’s best, looked good to his word when he fought back valiantly and had a golden chance to nick a marathon first set in the tiebreak on Sunday.

Yet once the world No.1 had edged that stanza, he moved up into a different gear to the Aussie No.1 with his powerful 7-6 (7-5) 6-2 triumph.

The bad news for de Minaur, who lost all three of his matches on his ATP Finals debut last year, was that another defeat has again put him on the backfoot to earn a semi-final place.

The good news was the world No.7 played enough sparkling tennis to encourage himself he can still beat Lorenzo Musetti and Taylor Fritz, the other two players contending for the top-two spots in the Jimmy Connors Group, and make the last-four.

Italian world No.9 Musetti, drafted in as replacement for the injured Novak Djokovic who’d just beaten him in the Athens final, and world No.4 Fritz will meet on Monday at the Inalpi Arena.

“It was a very difficult match,” said Alcaraz, who’s determined to add a Finals win to his extraordinary resume at just 22.

“Alex on this surface is really good — he makes the most of the speed of the court as he’s super fast. So I’m really happy to get through this really difficult challenge and happy the way I played.”

On this form, the six-time grand slam champ will take some stopping as he also aims to seal the end-of-year No.1 ranking ahead of reigning Finals champion Jannik Sinner.

For while de Minaur was attired as the man in black, there were times when he looked across the net and must have wondered if the lad with the bleached blond hair might be some alien life force, such was the outlandish brilliance Alcaraz was exhibiting.

Alcaraz pounded 32 winners past him, the last being a matchpoint-winning flat backhand that flashed into the corner, ending proceedings after 100 minutes.

De Minaur had played well, making 11 fewer errors than Alcaraz’s 28, and plenty of times had the young great looking frustrated as he tried to break down the wall.

But not for the first time, the 26-year-old Sydneysider couldn’t quite deliver on key points as Alcaraz’s superior firepower earned him a fifth straight win over de Minaur.

‘Demon’ will wonder how the devil he let the first set slip after he’d battled from 1-4, 0-40 down only to drag the stanza into a tiebreak and have two serves, at 5-3 up in the breaker, to seal it.

But he missing both first serves, Alcaraz then gobbling up four points in a row.

Even though broken to love again at the start of the second set, de Minaur again hit back, forcing the Spaniard to unveil his very best.

Yet Alcaraz still found it hard to shake off de Minaur, who even when 4-1 down and almost out in the second, could still rouse himself to win an amazing point with a full-stretch volley.

Later on Sunday, German two-time champion Alexander Zverev was set to take on American Finals debutant Ben Shelton in the Bjorn Borg Group.