Carlos Alcaraz has disagreed with Jannik Sinner and admitted he played an exhibition event in Saudi Arabia for the money. “You have to be realistic,” claimed the Spaniard.
The world No.1 banked £4.6m – the biggest winners’ cheque in tennis history – by beating the Wimbledon champion in the final of the Six Kings Slam earlier this month.
Novak Djokovic, Rafael Nadal, Holger Rune and Daniil Medvedev were also guaranteed £1.15m for just turning up.
Speaking before the ATP Rolex Paris Masters, the Italian told Eurosport: “I don’t play for money, it’s very simple. Sure, six million is a lot of prize money, but I went to Riyadh because there were probably the six best players in the world, and you can measure yourself against them.”
But in his pre-tournament press conference in the French capital on Monday, Alcaraz admitted that cash is king.
The Spaniard smiled: “Well, I mean, if I say: ‘I went there just for fun or to play and forget the money, I’m gonna lie’. I mean, every person works for that, as well. You know, that’s how life is about.
“I love playing tennis. You know, most of the time I don’t think about the money. I just play for love or for fun. But you have to be realistic. You have to think that you want to earn money, you know, and that’s it.
“You know, in Arabia it was the highest prize money ever in history, so that was a good motivation, at least for me.”
Alcaraz has beaten Sinner in their last three Tour-level meetings before Saudi Arabia – including the semi-final at Roland Garros – but still trails the Italian by over 4,000 points at the top of the rankings.
Asked if he needed to be more consistent, the world No.2 said: “Yeah, for sure. I mean, it doesn’t matter that I have beaten Jannik three times. Probably I didn’t play good tennis in some tournaments.
“You know, my percentage of wins this year is really, really high, but Jannik is another level this year, so over the 91% of wins this year. So just few players have done this before.
“But I think every player is looking to be more consistent during the year. You know, in every tournament that you’re going to play, you want to go far or as far as you can. That’s my goal for next year. In the tournaments that I didn’t play well or I didn’t go as far as I wanted, I just try to do it. I will try to not lose in the first rounds that probably this year I have lost in the first rounds.”
Content Source: www.express.co.uk