Carlos Alcaraz faced a top-25 opponent for the first time after returning from his wrist injury, and he removed all the lingering doubts about his recovery. The second seed defeated the 20th seed Tommy Paul in straight sets to reach the quarterfinals, extending his Grand Slam winning streak to 18 matches, 11 of them at Flushing Meadows alone. 

After the match, in the on-court interview, when he was asked whether he was back to his full strength since returning, Alcaraz replied with a chuckle.

“I mean, I think so,” he said. “Except one year since 2021, I make almost quarterfinals here. So that means, you know, how special this place is to me. That means how good I’m playing every time that I come here. So I’m just trying to enjoy my time on the court. So probably it doesn’t matter that I was out for four months and a half, that every time that I come here, I play my best.”

The Spaniard has dropped just one set across his four matches this fortnight in his wins over Roman Safiullin, Jaime Faria and Wu Yibing before Tuesday’s win over Paul, and has described himself as feeling better after every match since his return. The American tried to make it a contest by hitting as hard as Alcaraz on both wings, but the Spaniard just proved too good for the former World No. 8. Once Alcaraz broke Paul’s serve in the eighth game, he took control of the first set and then never let go. 

The seven-time Grand Slam champion opened the second set with a hold and a break and closed it out in 49 minutes. Alcaraz applied constant pressure on Tommy Paul’s serve throughout, generating 14 break point opportunities and seizing four out of them.  The two-time US Open champion hit a monstrous forehand winner to set up the match point before Paul netted a return to seal the victory in two hours and 21 minutes.

“I think I just played my game. I tried to play my style,” Alcaraz credited his own gameplay after the victory in the on-court interview. “Tommy is such a talented player, I think his shots are pretty dangerous and sometimes pretty difficult to control the ball when it comes to you. So I just try to be ready for the battles, to be ready to run if it matters, and trying to be aggressive all the time, trying not to let him stay on the court. I just put so much pressure on the return games, which for me, it helped a lot to play relaxed, to play calm, to think clearly. So I just got really, really happy with the performance today.”

A near-perfect US Open record

The victory marked Alcaraz’s seventh straight win over Paul in their nine career meetings and pushed his tournament record to a historic 28-3, a winning percentage of 93 percent, the highest ever at the US Open. It also marked his fifth quarterfinal in six appearances, with the lone blip coming in 2024, when he lost to Botic van de Zandschulp in the second round. Since turning professional, Alcaraz has now reached the quarterfinals or better at a Grand Slam for the 15th time in his career. 

He will now lock horns with the winner of a fourth-round match between 8th seed Ben Shelton and former world No.3 Stefanos Tsitsipas. The Spaniard holds a perfect head-to-head record over both opponents. Alcaraz claimed the most recent of his three wins over Shelton in the Round of 16 of last year’s French Open, while three of his six career wins over Tsitsipas have come at Grand Slam level, starting with a third-round meeting at the 2021 US Open and followed by back-to-back quarterfinal wins at Roland Garros in 2023 and 2024.

Whichever player emerges from that battle, Carlos Alcaraz will be the man to beat to make it to the last four in New York.