Round Saturday for Carlos Alcaraz in Seoul. Ninety minutes, a victory and a check worthy of a Grand Slam. This is how number one started … of the world his season, beating Jannik Sinner in an exhibition match in the capital of Korea that left a figure as striking as the duel itself: close to two million euros for taking to the court, according to La Gazzetta.
The match, without points for the ranking and conceived as a spectacle, turned every minute of play into pure gold. Alcaraz earned around 22,000 euros for each minute played, a remuneration that places this friendly at the level of the biggest prizes on the professional circuit. To put it in context, the loot obtained in South Korea is just 400,000 euros less than what the Australian Open champion receives after two weeks of maximum competitive demand. in the first Grand Slam of the year.
Before 12,000 spectators who packed the stands of the Inspire Arena, tickets cost between 100 and 700 euros, the Spaniard and the Italian offered an intense confrontation, closer to a luxury training session than an official battle, but with the quality that defines them as the two best tennis players of the moment. The victory fell to Alcaraz by 7-5 and 7-6, who used the duel as a high-level preparation before the start of the official calendar.
During the match, a young Korean jumped onto the court, at the invitation of Sinner, to play against Carlos Alcaraz and was able to win a point against the world number one.
The bowling business
This type of exhibition has become an increasingly common avenue for tennis greats. In a saturated and demanding calendar, friendly matches concentrate income in a single day that sometimes exceeds that of entire tournaments, with much less physical and mental wear. For the organizers, bringing together names like Alcaraz and Sinner guarantees global media attention; For players, it represents an economic opportunity that is difficult to reject.
Alcaraz himself has publicly defended himself against the criticism generated by this trend. “It’s normal that people don’t understand why we complain about the schedule and then play the exhibitions,” he explained three months ago in Riyadh after another exhibition. The Murcian then highlighted the difference in demands between both formats: «A tournament is very hard, both physically and mentally, because they are two weeks of maximum intensity. An exhibition is just one day: you have to be focused, warm up and train little, thinking only about that game.
The case of Seoul is especially significant: Alcaraz won in an hour and a half almost the same as he would get if he won his first Australian Open. A comparison that reflects to what extent the exhibition business has reached figures typical of the major titles and confirms the Spaniard’s status as one of the main attractions of world tennis.
