"They're somehow forcing us to play" - Carlos Alcaraz slams ATP as injury layoff motivates drastic scheduling changes

It is back-to-back wins for Carlos Alcaraz who managed to overturn an early deficit to fire past Jaime Faria 4-6 6-0, 6-3, 6-2 to prolong his quest for more US Open glory. As he continues to get back into his stride on court amid a long period away from it, he vowed an ominous promise for many big tournaments who may not be seeing much of him in the future.

The seven-time Grand Slam champion had numerous tennis fans on the edge of their seats following him losing the first set against the Portuguese. Faria was the first to strike, but a bagel response in 33 minutes got Alcaraz back on track.

He was able to come through the next two sets with relative ease, dominating and dictating proceedings as the 23-year-old creeps ever closer to his rampant best form.

After losing the first set, Alcaraz dropped just five games. It was a great sign following his straight sets first round win against Roman Safiullin. He was pushed slightly further this time around and was able to prevail nevertheless.

While it was a beneficial test, Alcaraz did wish it was a quicker match, but in hindsight was able to seek the positives. "Honestly, I would have liked it to be quick," he said in his press conference. "I'm not going to lie. But in the end, I realised that playing four sets was really beneficial for me, to test my physical endurance, to see how my body reacted, how I felt and how I will feel tomorrow after this match, after four sets.

"I'm glad I was able to play good tennis throughout the four sets, but obviously, since it was the second match of the evening, I would have preferred it to be quicker."

There is also going to be lingering concerns and worries about the wrist that kept him out of the sport for so long. For the time being, no such problems are there on the surface with Alcaraz adamant that he feels great on court.

"Obviously, competition is a completely different world from practice," he admitted. "But I trained normally, hitting my forehand with a lot of freedom and without thinking about my wrist at any moment, neither in practice nor in matches. I know that when I'm on court, I have to give everything every time. I have to feel normal. I have to hit the ball the way I did before my injury and see what happens. I feel great. There's no reason to be afraid or not to play normally."

Alcaraz has not been the only player to come down with a lengthy injury. As this tournament proceeds, Jannik Sinner is sitting at home watching from afar with a poorly right knee. Holger Rune remains out of the sport with an achilles problem while other cases are becoming increasingly more common.

A large part of this widely discussed problem is the sheer number of tournaments that are currently being played. Alcaraz was someone who would consistently play in a number of tournaments throughout the season, but now has acknowledged that this is simply not possible anymore as he looks to keep himself in a good condition.

"Honestly, my break was longer than expected," he stated. "Given the packed schedule, I obviously didn't want to stop because of an injury. However, in the future, I will take breaks, longer breaks."

He outlined how long these breaks could be. "Maybe not four months, but one or two months, skipping certain tournaments, because it's impossible to play them all."

The ATP's way of getting players to compete is by threatening them with ranking point deductions and if they do rack up enough events competed in, then they get a share of a sweet financial bonus. This tally of tournaments grows and Alcaraz, among others, is simply not willing to keep up. "I think they keep adding more and more mandatory tournaments. They're somehow forcing us to play," he continued.

"You can say no, that we can keep one or two, that we can decide our own schedule, but there are Masters 1000s, Grand Slams, and if we have to play all the mandatory events imposed by the ATP, we'll be competing for about 40 weeks."

With all this comes the obvious threat of injuries. "It's impossible, and we see a lot of players getting injured, a lot of players getting tired. If nothing is done, we'll see even more cases in the future. Personally, this injury break wasn't a good thing, but I want to make it clear that in the future, I will take breaks and skip tournaments, that's for sure."

For the time being, the only thought on Alcaraz's mind is more glory at Flushing Meadows. He will come up against Yibing Wu in the third round as he seeks a third US Open title.