By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
Defending champion Carlos Alcaraz reached the Frech Open final on Friday after Lorenzo Musetti retired from their semifinal early in the fourth set.
Alcaraz led 4-6 7-6 (7-3) 6-0 2-0 when Italy’s Musetti, aiming to reach his first major final, was forced to end the match early.
Eighth seed Musetti had had treatment for a thigh problem at the end of the third set.
“It’s never fair. I want to win but not like this,” said Alcaraz.
The pair have been the leading clay-court players on the ATP Tour this year and showed why in two competitive sets.
But once he levelled, 22-year-old Alcaraz unleashed his attacking shots to devastating effect to take control of the match.
Four-time Grand Slam champion Alcaraz, who won Roland Garros for the first time last year, will face either Novak Djokovic or Jannik Sinner in Sunday’s final.
Sinner has stormed into the last four without dropping a set while Djokovic impressed in a four-set win over last year’s runner-up Alexander Zverev in the quarter-finals.
Top seed and three-time Grand Slam winner Sinner takes on the most successful man ever to play the sport in a rivalry that connects one generation to the next.
Sinner, 23, and Djokovic, 38, have split their eight meetings, but the Italian has won four of the last five matches to signal the undeniable power shift in men’s tennis.
Sinner is riding a 19-match winning run at Grand Slams as he chases a third successive major title, looking to go a step further at Roland Garros than last year’s semi-final loss to Alcaraz in five sets.
Djokovic could become the first man to beat the world’s top three players en route to a Grand Slam title after defeating third-ranked Zverev in the last eight.