Carlos Alcaraz returns to Roland Garros final after Lorenzo Musetti retires in semifinal

Carlos Alcaraz is back into the final at Roland Garros after Lorenzo Musetti was forced to retire from their semifinal match in the fourth set due to a leg injury.

After dropping his fourth set of the tournament, Alcaraz was leading Musetti 4-6, 7-6(3), 6-0, 2-0 when the Italian ultimately could not continue after two hours, 25 minutes. A short while earlier, trailing 0-5 in the third set, Musetti called for the physio to receive treatment on his upper left leg, having first reached for it after landing awk

"It's never great to get through or win the match like this," Alcaraz said afterwards. "Lorenzo is a great player; he has done an incredible clay season, he's one of the few players who achieved at least the semifinals in all the big events on clay. ... That shows what an incredible player he is. I just wish him all the best, soon recovery, and I'm sure we're going to enjoy his tennis again pretty soon."

Musetti is the third man in the Open Era who has retired from a Roland Garros semifinal, following David Nalbandian in 2006 against Roger Federer and Alexander Zverev against Rafael Nadal in 2022.

Before Musetti's injury, Alcaraz said he was able to swing freer after capturing a see-saw second in which the players traded breaks twice. Alcaraz was the one ahead, first at 2-1 and again at 6-5, but found his best level in the tiebreak. He led 6-1 before converting on his fourth set point a while later.

"The first two sets were really tough. I had chances to break his serve, to be up in the match, and I couldn't make the most of it," Alcaraz said. "He was playing great tennis. When I won the second set, it was a little bit of relief, and in the third set I knew what I had to do in the beginning: pushing him to the limit, trying to be aggressive and not let him dominate the game, and just be myself.

"I was more calm, I could see things more clear, and I could play great tennis at the beginning of the third set."

Aiming to improve to 4-0 in Grand Slam finals, Alcaraz will face either world No. 1 Jannik Sinner or sixth-seeded Novak Djokovic, the 24-time Grand Slam winner, in the final.

The Spaniard said the second semifinal would be must-see TV.

"For sure, I'm not going to miss it," he said. "This match-up is one of the best match-ups that we have in tennis right now; Sinner against Djokovic, it's going to be great tennis. As a huge fan of tennis, I'm going to watch it, I'm going to enjoy it, obviously I'm going to take tactics from that match, but we're all going to watch and enjoy it because I think they're going to play a great match."