Holger Rune vaguely claims of physical distress before Carlos Alcaraz clash after losing in straight-sets in the Wimbledon quarter-finals
Rune tried to explain his lop-sided loss to the top seed Alcaraz during the post - match interview.
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Holger Rune and Carlos Alcaraz (Credits: Wimbledon and Reuters)
Danish tennis sensation Holger Rune talked of his Wimbledon quarterfinal loss to top seed Carlos Alcaraz at great length during his post-match press conference. The 20 – year old attributed his straight sets loss, with a final score line of 6 – 7(3), 4 – 6, 4 – 6 in favor of the Spaniard, to various reasons. The first of these was the claim that he woke up “feeling not so good” and couldn’t compete at his regular energy level.
“Yeah, this morning I didn’t feel very good when I woke up. But, again, it’s normal. You don’t feel good every time you wake up. But, yeah, I had to do everything I could to feel better for the match, but didn’t have the same energy as I normally have when I play. Yeah, I tried. I tried everything I could,” Rune said.
On being asked whether he felt sick during the match, Rune kept his answers rather vague. “This morning I felt a bit bad when I woke up. Carried it a little bit in the warm-up. Yeah, I mean, it’s a part of it. Sometimes when you play in many tournaments, many matches, you start to feel it also. Actually, in Paris last year, I also felt it. But there it went well. I just think it’s a part of it. It’s normal as humans.”
Holger Rune’s meteoric rise to the top of the sport
Rune is one of the hottest prospects in the tennis circuit, and his rise to the top 10 of the rankings has been meteoric, much like current world no. 1 and childhood friend Carlos Alcaraz. The two 20 – year olds, along with Italy’s Jannik Sinner, are bringing back a brand of fast, attacking tennis that focuses more on shot-making than on defensive plays. Their matches come out to be particularly appealing for their cutthroat approach to the game, with no dearth of winners and volleying at the net.
While Rune is racing to the top of the sport, there are some hurdles that the Dane has had trouble overcoming so far. One for example is his inability to progress beyond the quarterfinal stage in a major. With three quarterfinal exits at slams (French Open ’22, ’23, and Wimbledon ’23), there is but a slight chance that Rune could develop a mental block to the stage in a Slam.
It is worthy of note that going into Wimbledon this year, Rune had never won a grass-court match in his entire career. This makes his quarterfinal run this year all the more incredible. Nonetheless, Rune has no time to celebrate and is already up to analyze his loss to Alcaraz.
Alcaraz, on the other hand, is in his first Wimbledon semifinal and is set to face Russia’s Daniil Medvedev.
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Ketan Kunkalikar
(129 Articles Published)