"I’m screwed": Carlos Alcaraz highlights where it all went wrong for him during defeat in Miami Open opener

Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz has admitted that he performed poorly in his defeat in the second round of the Miami Open. The 21-year-old is already regarded as one of the best players currently playing in men’s tennis in the singles category.

Alcaraz’s most recent outing was at the Indian Wells, where he was knocked out after losing in the round of 64 to Belgium’s David Goffin with a score of 5-7, 6-4, 6-3. The defeat has served as a major blow to the young Spaniard who was hoping to reduce the gap between the world number one Jannik Sinner — who is currently spending time on the sidelines because of a three-month ban following two positive dope tests last year — and himself.

With that defeat, Alcaraz is out of the race to become the world number one before Sinner returns to the court in May of this year. The four-time Grand Slam winner spoke to the media after the match and admitted that his performance was now way near good enough on the day. Alcaraz also admitted that a lack of confidence in his game was visible in the second and third sets, where he failed to ‘push’ himself to produce better tennis.

“It was a very poor performance on my part, I admit it, he was a better player than me. I didn’t play well, and I didn’t feel good physically either,” said Alcaraz. “In these kinds of matches, when you don’t feel that confidence either in terms of tennis skills or physically, everything becomes much harder. I believe this was evident in the second and third sets where I couldn’t push myself to produce better tennis. I started playing worse from the beginning, making some mistakes until he broke my serve. Being a break down in the third set made me feel very bad. Mentally, I’m screwed, honestly; this is a tournament where I want to do well, and losing in the first round hurts a lot.”