Wimbledon: Alcaraz battles past Fritz to keep hat-trick hopes on track

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Carlos Alcaraz battled his way into a third consecutive Wimbledon final following a thrilling four-set victory over Taylor Fritz.

Alcaraz, who is aiming to become only the fifth player to clinch a hat-trick of victories at the All England Club, emerged a 6-4 5-7 6-3 7-6 (8-6) victor on Centre Court on Friday (July 11).

The second seed set the tone in the first set with a break in the opening game, and duly held his serve from there.

But Fritz responded emphatically in the second, more than matching the defending champion throughout before levelling the match with a love game against the serve.

As he did in the first set, Alcaraz got the better of Fritz's serve early in the third, going to within one set of victory with the American seemingly down and out.

Fritz, though, showed great resilience to force a tie-break.

Alcaraz raced into a 4-1 lead, yet Fritz stormed back to go 6-4 up, bringing up two set points.

Yet Alcaraz rallied, clawing back both of those points before clinching the victory against the serve as he saw a backhand returned long by Fritz.

He will now face world number one Jannik Sinner in Sunday's final after the latter defeated seven-time champion Novak Djokovic in straight sets 6-3 6-3 6-4.

Data Debrief: King Carlos marches on

Alcaraz has found a home away from home at Wimbledon, with his victory over Fritz bringing up his 20th consecutive win at the All England Club, and extending his current winning streak on the Tour to 24 matches.

At 22 years and 56 days, Alcaraz is the third-youngest player in the Open Era to reach consecutive men's singles finals at both Wimbledon and Roland-Garros, after Bjorn Borg and Rafael Nadal (22 years 20 days).

He is also now the youngest player to claim 10 ATP top-five victories at grand slam events.

Indeed, since the rankings were first published in 1973, Alcaraz (71.4%, 10-4) now holds the highest win rate of any player against ATP top five opponents at grand slam events, surpassing Pete Sampras (70.8%) and Borg (70.0%) – minimum 10 matches.