Former tennis star Andy Roddick believes Carlos Alcaraz’s serve is the one thing he hasn’t improved in the past two years.
While speaking on the ‘Served with Andy Roddick’ podcast, the 2003 US Open winner went in detail about the Spaniard’s serve.
“I think his serve leaves a lot to be desired. That is the one thing that I don’t think has really improved much at all in the last two years. I remember watching him, kind of his breakout – we knew about him – but winning Miami a couple of years ago and he was serving 135, and now I feel like he’s serving 127,” said Roddick.
“There’s not a lot of motion to it, right? There are big servers, who serve straight through the court. And so, they are the type of servers that serve 136, but if you get a racket on it, you can square it up a little bit.
“And then there’s like the Federer type servers that can serve 118 and the ball’s sliding against your racket and it just feels a little bit squirrely – so where you are kind of hitting foul balls off the serve.”
The 41-year-old said that improvement in Alcaraz’s serve will make him an even more lethal player, especially considering his other skills on the court.
“Alcaraz, if he’s not hitting that kick serve – that’s getting you up and away and out of the zone – it feels like people are able to firm up his first serve when he goes after it. You need to create a little motion on that serve, he needs to create a little bit of tail,” Roddick added.
“Especially with how good he is on that first ball and how much he can bully you. Right now, even his slice serve feels like it kind of goes straight. It doesn’t have that like Sampras swing on it where it’s tailing away from you and you are kind of having to chase it.
“It’s like, if you read it right, you can kind of square it up and get that good pop sound to it. So, I think the serve is the most obvious place to improve with Alcaraz.”
It must be noted that Alcaraz lost to Alexander Zverev in the quarter-final of the Australian Open last month. The Spanish star has already won two slams, including Wimbledon and the US Open.
