Alcaraz supports the elimination of late night matches in Grand Slam tournaments

== sync, corrected by elderman == @elder_man

The drop of water: dawn at the US Open

Carlos Alcaraz has a clear request for the organisers of Grand Slams: enough with matches dragging on until dawn.

That match, won by Shelton in five sets, began on a Tuesday night and did not end until 3:30 local time after 4 hours 28 minutes of play.

What Alcaraz said in London

On the eve of the Laver Cup, the current world number three opened the game in a press conference: according to him, whoever closes a match at 3:30 p.m. only leaves the court at 4:30 and returns to the hotel at dawn, without going to bed before 6:30 or 7:00 am.

The central point of Alcaraz's argument is recovery: whoever plays at dawn comes to a physical disadvantage in the next commitment, and it is the opponent who takes advantage. "It is too much. They are going to have to do something", said the winner of seven Grand Slams, which was not limited to extreme cases for him, ending a match at attacking midfielder -night is already too late.

The stage at each Grand Slam

The problem is not exclusive to New York. Wimbledon is the exception among the four Majors: there, matches end at 11 pm local time. US Open, Roland Garros and Australian Open have no cut-off times for interrupting games.

In practice, this has already yielded scenes similar to that of Alcaraz: in 2024, Novak Djokovic's victory over Lorenzo Musetti on the third matchday of Roland Garros ended at 3:07 am in Paris, and in New York and Melbourne games often extend into the early hours.

Solutions under discussion

There are two ideas circulating in the circle. The first is that we need to get out of here.

• to adopt the best-of-three set format used in other ATP tournaments at Grand Slams;
• Reduce from six to four the number of games needed to close a set proposal that Djokovic himself defended in August.

Agassi is against it: "a gladiatorial sport"

Andre Agassi, eight-time Grand Slam champion and captain of the Rest Of The World team in the Laver Cup, has argued that the five-set format should remain intact.

"I'm absolutely sure we should keep this format", said the American, admitting that the late finish is "a shame" and that he himself has lived through it many times. For Agassi, winning a Grand Slam is valuable precisely because it requires the player to take his capabilities to the limit "continue being a gladiator sport", summed up, concluding that there must be distinction between the Majors and the rest of the calendar.

Where the discussion is now

The debate remains open: on the one hand, the numbers of the current world number three and the historical precedent of the US Open with Shelton at 3:30; on the other, the resistance of champions like Agassi to the change in format.