Carlos Alcaraz has shown no signs of rust at the US Open as he played his first tournament in four months after wrist injury.
According to The National, Alcaraz breeze into the quarter-finals with a 6-4, 6-3, 6-4 victory over Tommy Paul on Sunday, September 6, in New York.
Alcaraz, a seven-time Grand Slam winner and defending US Open champion, has dropped just one set over his first four matches.
The 23-year-old Spanish star and world No 3 broke the 29-year-old American's serve to clinch the first set, broke him again twice early in the second set and once again early in the third en route to the two-hour, 21-minute victory.
He leads the head-to-head series 7-2 and has defeated Paul at all four Grand Slam events, becoming only the 10th man to achieve that feat in the Open Era.
Alcaraz said in his on-court interview, "I played my game. I tried to play my style. Tommy is such a talented player. His shots are pretty dangerous and sometimes it is really difficult to control the ball when it comes to you. I just tried to be ready for a battle and tried to be aggressive all the time.
"I tried not to let him stay [high up] on the court and I think I did pretty well to put so much pressure on return games, which for me helped a lot to play relaxed, to play calm and think clearly. I'm really happy with the performance today," he added.
The Spanish tennis player has won 18 straight matches at majors, a personal high that includes his 2025 US Open win and January's Australian Open title, which made him the youngest man to complete the career Grand Slam.
Shelton makes quick work of Tsitsipas
Second seed Alcaraz, who is 26-3 this season, will face No 8 seed Ben Shelton in the quarter-finals after the American took care of Greece's Stefanos Tsitsipas in the quickest men's match of the day, a 6-2, 6-3, 6-4 win in 1 hour, 52 minutes.
After Shelton dropped one set in each of his first three matches, he dominated his last-16 match, finishing with 12 aces and one double fault.
Shelton said of what it will take to oust Alcaraz, "Special tennis. I think the level that he's been playing at is really impressive. To not play for five months, come out and do what he does so far this tournament has been superhuman ... I think it's going to be fireworks on Tuesday night."
Notably, Shelton is riding serious momentum into his match against Alcaraz, who is 3-0 against Shelton all-time. One of those wins came at a Grand Slam in the 2025 French Open.
