Newsletter

Count of Godó 2023: Nadal and Alcaraz for a luxury Godó | Sports

The Conde de Godó tournament (Barcelona Open Banc Sabadell) celebrates its 70th anniversary this year and for this it will have a flashy poster. As confirmed by the organization this Tuesday, Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz, the two great male references of Spanish tennis, will parade from April 15 to 23 on the courts of the Real Club Tenis Barcelona. The Murcian has just recovered the number one in the world thanks to his victory in the Masters 1000 in Indian Wells, while the Spaniard speeds up the days to arrive in the best possible condition for the clay court tour after the injury suffered in Australia.

Nadal injured his iliac psoas (Grade 2) on January 18, during the second round duel of the Australian great against Mackenzie McDonald. The Spaniard, who will turn 37 on June 3, is making good progress and gradually increasing the pace of training. A 12-time champion in Barcelona, ​​the Spaniard will reappear in the RCTB after not being able to compete a year ago due to a rib injury. He will be the great attraction together with Alcaraz, defender of the title and that last Sunday he returned to the top of the ranking.

The man from Palmar, who signed a memorable tournament last year –victory in three sets in the quarterfinals against Tsitsipas, in addition to moving on the wire by saving two match points against De Minaur in the semifinals–, will have the goal of winning his second Godó consecutive to catch race and prepare his main goal of the clay court season: win Roland Garros, Nadal’s territory.

The main novelty of this seventieth edition of the Catalan tournament will be the appearance of Daniil Medvedev (finalist in 2019 against Thiem) and Jannik Sinner (semifinalist in 2021 against Tsitsipas). Both were defeated by Alcaraz last week in Indian Wells –7-6, 6-3 against the Italian in the semifinals and 6-3, 6-2 against the Russian in the final–, so their participation will be one more incentive in a very competitive poster and where the pairings will be able to give level matches, very common in the land of Barcelona.

“It is a difficult list to improve. Perhaps it will be the best ATP 500 this year”, assesses the tournament director, David Ferrer, happy to be able to count on four members of the top-5. One of them is the Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas (3rd) and another the Norwegian Casper Ruud (4th). The Greek will return to the place where he made himself known, unexpectedly reaching the 2018 final, when he succumbed to Nadal (6-2 and 6-1); Meanwhile, the Nordic will try to change the trend of his irregular start to the season to be able to emulate his great tour on clay last year, with the Roland Garros final as the culmination.

Four of the first five rackets and eleven of the twenty best players in the world will appear in Barcelona, ​​where we must not lose sight of the rest of the Spaniards such as Pablo Carreño, current runner-up and number 19 of the ranking ATP; Alejandro Davidovich, who opens his best position this week (25th); or Roberto Bautista, Bernabé Zapata, Albert Ramos and Jaume Munar, among others. All this in a special edition for the RCTB and its club tennis.

You can follow EL PAÍS Sports on Facebook y Twitterpoint here to receive our weekly newsletter.

Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Trending