Caroline Garcia believes the presence of Jannik Sinner draws the best out of Carlos Alcaraz, and that's a big reason why the Spanish tennis star has been so great over the past couple of months.
At the start of the year, Alcaraz wasn't up to his usual standard and picked up a couple of surprising defeats. But after Sinner returned from his three-month doping suspension at the Rome Masters, that's when the Spaniard's great run started.
Firstly, Alcaraz defeated Sinner in back-to-back finals at the Rome Masters and French Open. While the Spaniard lost to the Italian in the Wimbledon title match, he got his revenge by overcoming the 24-year-old in the Cincinnati Masters and US Open finals. Overall, the Spaniard - who returned to the world No. 1 spot two weeks ago - has won five of his last six tournaments played.
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Garcia: Alcaraz needs competition... He started to play better when Sinner returned
Obviously, Jannik and Carlos are above all the other players for now. But theyCarlos definitely needs Sinner; he started to play really good this year when Jannik came back. It looks like the mentality of Jannik is a bit different, but Carlos needs competition; he needs a rival, and when he has one, hes very good, and his focus is way better and more consistent. He really needs a rivalry, and obviously, he knows how to do everything, but he needs someone in front of him to be able to challenge him and push him further," Garcia explained on the Roland-Garros podcast.
After being bounced by Alcaraz in four sets in the US Open final, Sinner made a deeply honest comment when he admitted that his game became "too predictable" for the Spaniard. In the same presser, the 24-year-old Italian said he would talk with his team and try to figure out how to play against the Spaniard in a different way going forward.
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Alcaraz leads their head-to-head10-5.
