Carlos Alcaraz’s extended Grunting: A Winning Strategy or a Disturbing Disruption?
Carlos Alcaraz has dismissed Stefanos Tsitsipas’ suggestions that he dragged out his grunts “longer than normal” during their quarter-final clash at Roland Garros, but some of the tennis greats believe the Spaniard’s grunting was “a little longer” than usual.
World No 3 Alcaraz once again dominated against Tsitsipas as he brushed the Greek aside with a 6-3, 7-6 (7-3), 6-4 victory to set up a French Open semi-final clash with Jannik Sinner.
It was another brutal encounter for Tsitsipas as he is now 0-6 in his head-to-head with the Spaniard and his frustrations boiled over as played several erratic shots, remonstrated with his coaching team and also complained to the chair umpire about his opponent’s extensive grunting.
After going 1-6 down in the second-set tie-breaker, the Greek went over to the official to explain. “There is an extended grunt. Maybe without the grunt when I hit… When I hit the shot, the grunt is extended. When I am about to hit the shot, I can hear his grunt… it’s like a millisecond before I hit [the shot],” he said.
Maybe there’s one question that we need to ask Carlos; when does he grunt and when does he not grunt? Because it does seem like he grunts when he hits the ball hard, but the next time he does it, he doesn’t grunt.
