Alcaraz defeats a determined Cilic on his Doha debut

Fresh from winning his first indoor title since the start of his career at Rotterdam, Carlos Alcaraz is looking to confirm his success in Doha.

For the first time, the Spaniard will take part in the tournament in Qatar, where he is the main headliner due to his status as world number 3 and number 1 seed.

Alcaraz's first round opponent is Marin Cilic. The Croatian, winner of the 2014 US Open and down to world no. 192, who benefited from a protected ranking to enter the main draw directly, is aiming for a big performance to try and take out Alcaraz.

A tricky first round for the 21-year-old, even if he leads 3-1 in head-to-head meetings before this new face-off.

In their first meeting since the Round of 16 at the US Open 2022, when Alcaraz won in five sets against a Cilic who was still in the top 20 at the time, the two men battled it out right down to the last game.

Alcaraz took the first set in almost an hour. Aided by his opponent's five double faults, the four-time Grand Slam winner, who had been broken early on, recovered perfectly to take the lead.

In the second set, Alcaraz also had to make do with the experience of Cilic, who never gave up.

With the Croatian leading 4 games to 3, he won three break points in a row on the world number 3's serve.

It was from this point on that Alcaraz once again accelerated, eventually winning the game, before saving a break point in the game where he was serving for the match.

In the end, hierarchy was respected and the Spaniard won his first round match in Doha (6-4, 6-4). In the Round of 16, he will face the winner of the match between Zhang Zhizhen and Luca Nardi, who will meet on Tuesday on the Qatari courts.