分类： sports

Even at just 22 years old and already established as one of the world’s top tennis talents, Carlos Alcaraz is paving the way for a new wave of elite Spanish men’s tennis prospects — and two rising stars are ready to seize their moment at the 2024 Madrid Open after Alcaraz was forced to withdraw due to a wrist injury.

Nineteen-year-old Rafael “Rafa” Jódar, a prospect sharing a first name and nickname with Spanish tennis legend Rafael Nadal, has captured global tennis attention over the past 12 months with one of the fastest ranking climbs the ATP Tour has seen in recent years. Just one year ago, Jódar sat outside the ATP’s top 600. By March 2024, he had cracked the top 100, and the latest ATP rankings released ahead of the Madrid Open pushed him all the way to world No. 42, booking him a spot in his first ever main draw at the Madrid-based ATP Masters 1000 event.

Jódar’s rapid ascent hit new milestones earlier this spring: he notched three straight-set wins to advance to the Barcelona Open semifinals, took home his first career ATP tour-level trophy at the Morocco Open earlier this May, and booked a spot in Spain’s 2024 Davis Cup training squad. A former US Open junior boys’ singles champion, Jódar spent 2023 competing collegiately at the University of Virginia before making the decision to turn professional. For the Madrid native, this week’s tournament carries extra personal meaning: he attended the event as a young spectator growing up, and will make his Madrid main draw debut against Netherlands’ Jesper de Jong, ranked world No. 109.

Speaking ahead of his debut, Jódar emphasized his calm approach to the sudden attention and pressure that has come with his breakout run. “I try to handle the pressure as I have done since I was little. I’ve always been a very calm person both on and off the court. I know there’ll be moments when things don’t go as well as they have in recent tournaments. In those moments, you prove whether you’re mentally strong. Those moments will also make me stronger,” he said. Rather than setting rigid long-term ranking targets, Jódar said he plans to focus on gaining experience in his first full season on tour: “I’ve never set myself a goal. I have to take it tournament by tournament, it’s my first year on tour. I think I’m still a young player and I’m discovering a lot at these tournaments. I need to gain experience, compete against these kinds of players. I don’t set targets for the future, just take it tournament by tournament and do my best.”

Joining Jódar as a hometown fan favorite in Madrid is 20-year-old Martin Landaluce, another top Spanish prospect who recently earned his own place in the ATP top 100, entering the tournament ranked world No. 99. Like Jódar, Landaluce is a former US Open junior boys’ singles champion, and he trains at the Rafa Nadal Academy. Landaluce notched his best ever ATP Masters 1000 result earlier this spring, reaching the Miami Open quarterfinals before falling to Czech player Jiri Lehecka. Both Jódar and Landaluce competed at the 2023 Next Gen ATP Finals, the annual showcase for the tour’s top players under 20 years old; Jódar defeated Landaluce in their head-to-head matchup, though neither advanced past the round-robin stage.

Reflecting on his breakthrough into the top 100, Landaluce said the milestone has only motivated him to reach higher. “It’s very special to see myself there (in the top 100). It’s something we’ve all wanted to achieve since we were young. I’ve never set a specific ranking goal, but now that I’m in this position, I believe I can go further, and that’s what I intend to do,” he said.

Alcaraz, the seven-time Grand Slam champion and world No. 2 who was forced to pull out of Madrid to recover from his wrist injury, has already thrown his full support behind the two rising stars, saying the pair will push each other to new heights in the coming years. “The two of them will mutually help each other to keep improving and reach the top. They have a great future,” Alcaraz told the ATP Tour. He praised Jódar specifically for his rapid adjustment to the top level of tour tennis, calling him “an outstanding player” who “has broken into the tour really quickly.” Alcaraz also spoke highly of Landaluce after recently practicing with him, describing the 20-year-old as “an incredible player.”

Jódar and Landaluce are far from the only Spanish men ranked inside the ATP top 100 ahead of the Madrid Open. They join Alejandro Davidovich Fokina (No. 24), Jaume Munar (No. 38), Roberto Bautista Agut (No. 93) and Pablo Carreño Busta (No. 94) in the top tier of men’s tennis, signaling a continued era of depth for Spanish men’s tennis.

As the countdown to September’s 2026 FIBA Women’s Basketball World Cup ticks down, the four-time defending champion United States has learned its path to history: the powerhouse U.S. squad will square off against China, Italy and the Czech Republic in Group D as it chases an unprecedented fifth consecutive World Cup crown.

Hosted in Berlin from September 4 to 13, this year’s tournament will force the WNBA to pause its regular season for nearly three weeks to allow top American players to compete for their national team, a scheduling adjustment that underscores the global event’s growing prestige. The U.S. women’s program has dominated this competition for nearly 15 years, claiming gold at every World Cup since 2010; their last missed top spot came in 2006, when they walked away with bronze. Most recently, the U.S. defeated China to claim gold at the 2022 tournament hosted in Australia, a rematch that fans could see in this year’s group stage play.

This year’s tournament marks a historic milestone for women’s basketball: following the runaway success of the 2022 Australia World Cup, organizers have expanded the competing field to 16 teams for the first time since 2018, up from the 12-team format that was used for many years. FIBA Secretary General Andreas Zagklis explained that the expansion is a direct reflection of the rapid growth of the women’s game across the globe. “We just finished qualifiers with 24 teams that had never happened before. We had played before with 16 teams,” Zagklis said. “Women’s basketball has grown a lot and 12 teams didn’t fit the quality we had. Sixteen represents what we believe is today’s standards for our women’s game.”

The U.S. roster this year is shaping up to be an exciting blend of veteran stardom and emerging young talent. Superstars A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart are expected to anchor the squad, while three of the most hyped young players in the women’s game — Caitlin Clark, Paige Bueckers and Angel Reese — are already proven competitors at the international level. The trio helped lead the U.S. to victory at the World Cup qualifying tournament held in Puerto Rico last month, confirming their ability to perform on the global stage.

Tournament play will follow a clear path to the final: the top team from each of the four groups will earn an automatic spot in the quarterfinals, while the second and third-place finishers from each pool will compete in knockout matches to claim the remaining four quarterfinal berths.

The full group draw features a range of compelling storylines across all pools. Host nation Germany, which is competing in its first Women’s World Cup since 1998, highlights Group A alongside Spain, Japan and Mali. Group B is headlined by France, which fell to the U.S. in the gold medal match at the 2024 Paris Olympics, and also includes Nigeria, South Korea and Hungary. 2022 host Australia leads Group C, where it will face Belgium, Puerto Rico and Turkey.

For years, Hungarian authoritarian populist leader Viktor Orbán—an avid lifelong soccer fan and a self-identified sports enthusiast who built a large part of his national legacy around hosting elite global sporting events—has been sidelined by a stunning heavy defeat in the country’s recent general election. His unexpected exit from power hands the spotlight to incoming Prime Minister Péter Magyar ahead of next month’s UEFA Champions League final, the crown jewel of European club soccer, set to take place in Budapest’s state-of-the-art Puskás Aréna on May 31. This political transition has sparked new uncertainty around the future of Orbán’s ambitious pipeline of elite sports initiatives, from upcoming track and swimming championships to a long-planned 2036 Olympic bid, and forces international sports governing bodies to adapt to a new government with sharply different priorities.

Orbán, a former lower-league Hungarian soccer player who has held a permanent spot in the VIP boxes at Champions League finals and FIFA World Cups for decades, poured billions in public funds into constructing a network of new, world-class stadiums across Hungary over his 12 years in power. The Puskás Aréna, which will host this year’s Champions League final, was always meant to be the crowning glory of his sports-focused statecraft. “That was supposed to be the icing on the cake for Orbán and his regime. He’s been working very hard to get that final to Budapest and to Hungary,” explained Győző Molnár, a professor of sport sociology at the University of Worcester. If Magyar, leader of the victorious Tisza party, takes the high-profile official spot at the final originally reserved for Orbán, Molnár added, it will serve as a clear public signal of a full regime change in the country.

For Orbán, elite international sporting events were never just about athletics: they served as a strategic counter to widespread criticism from the European Union over his government’s democratic backsliding, anti-LGBTQ+ policies, and opposition to EU support for war-torn Ukraine. By hosting major global tournaments, Orbán could frame international sports bodies’ willingness to partner with Hungary as a quiet endorsement of his rule, regardless of EU pushback. “These aren’t just sporting events for him. They were Orbán’s answer to, for instance, EU criticisms” that allowed him to argue “UEFA still trusts us with the biggest match,” Molnár noted. Still, not all of Orbán’s soccer ambitions panned out: despite tax breaks that encouraged allies to invest heavily in domestic Hungarian soccer clubs, the country’s national team has not qualified for a FIFA World Cup since 1986, a far cry from the legendary “Mighty Magyars” sides that finished as World Cup runners-up in 1938 and 1954.

Beyond the Champions League final, Orbán’s administration locked in a full slate of upcoming elite events: the inaugural track and field Ultimate Championships, which boasts the sport’s richest ever prize purse, is set for September in Budapest, with the 2025 World Swimming Championships—Hungary’s third in a decade—following the next year. Budapest has also been preparing a bid for the 2036 Summer Olympics, and over the past decade, multiple global sports governing bodies, including World Aquatics, have relocated their headquarters from Switzerland to Budapest, incentivized by generous packages including 15 years of free office space, legal immunity for official acts, and full tax benefits.

Since the election upset, however, questions have grown over whether the new Hungarian government will maintain Orbán’s focus on large-scale prestige sports projects. While Magyar has rejected opposition claims that he will cut overall sports funding, his Tisza party’s election platform marked a clear break from past policy, criticizing the Orbán administration for pouring public funds into overpriced stadiums and vanity projects while grassroots school and local sports programs have declined. Magyar has also pledged to end what he calls the systemic politicization of sports that flourished under Orbán, noting that “politics has become entrenched in the sports associations and the soccer clubs to a degree that we didn’t even see during socialism.”

So far, no scheduled events have been canceled, but long-term policy priorities are expected to shift. The new government will likely be focused heavily on addressing ongoing cost of living crises, a pressing concern across much of Europe in the current volatile global economic climate. Complicating the 2036 Olympic bid further is the political landscape in Budapest: the city’s mayor is a liberal opponent of Orbán who has no close alignment with Magyar’s party, and plans to revisit the bid next year after an earlier Orbán-backed 2024 bid was withdrawn. The International Olympic Committee has declined to comment on domestic political developments or the status of the bid.

International sports governing bodies have begun navigating the transition, with most reaffirming their commitment to upcoming events. World Athletics, which is preparing for September’s Ultimate Championships, stated that it continues to work closely with Hungarian partners to deliver a successful tournament. World Aquatics, which is scheduled to complete its relocation to Budapest by 2028, said it has a longstanding positive relationship with Hungary and “has no doubt that this relationship will continue to thrive under the new leadership of Péter Magyar, whom we congratulate on his recent victory as Prime Minister of Hungary.” UEFA, for its part, has said that planning for the Champions League final continues as scheduled, and declined to comment on whether it will extend invitations to both Orbán and Magyar for the match.

Two-time defending French Open men’s singles champion Carlos Alcaraz has opened up about the severity of his right wrist injury, confirming that the results of an upcoming medical scan will decide whether he can defend his title at the 2025 Roland Garros tournament, which kicks off on May 24. The world’s second-ranked men’s tennis player was forced to withdraw from back-to-back clay-court tournaments in the past week after picking up the injury during his opening-round win at the Barcelona Open. He subsequently pulled out of the Madrid Open, which is scheduled to begin play on Tuesday.

In a candid interview with Spanish public broadcaster TVE, the 22-year-old seven-time Grand Slam winner revealed the injury is more severe than his medical team initially anticipated. “We’ve been doing everything in our power to set this up for a good outcome,” Alcaraz said. “I’m staying patient, we’re just taking things day by day right now. We have a series of tests coming up over the next few days, and once we have those results, we’ll know the state of the injury and what our next move will be.”

Alcaraz’s recent drop in ranking adds an extra layer of stakes to his recovery: Italian star Jannik Sinner reclaimed the world No. 1 ranking earlier this month after defeating Alcaraz in the Monte Carlo Masters final. Alcaraz, who enjoyed a historic clay-court season in 2024 that included titles at Monte Carlo, Rome and Roland Garros, stands to lose a significant number of ranking points from his 2024 clay run, opening the door for Sinner to extend his lead at the top of the ATP rankings if Alcaraz is unable to compete in Paris.

For Alcaraz, however, long-term career health takes priority over short-term results. The young star said he would rather delay his return to competition than rush back and risk aggravating the injury. “I’d much rather come back a little later when I’m 100% match fit than jump back in too early, rushed and not feeling right,” he explained. “God willing, I’ve got a very long career ahead of me, and pushing too hard to play this Roland Garros could do serious damage that hurts my performance in future tournaments. Injuries are just part of professional sport, you have to accept when things don’t go your way. If I want to avoid this becoming a long-term problem, I need to recover properly first.”

Alcaraz has built an extraordinary record at the French Open over the past three years, reaching at least the semi-finals of the clay-court Grand Slam every event since 2023 and claiming back-to-back titles in 2023 and 2024. All eyes in the tennis world will now be on his upcoming test results to see whether he will get the chance to go for a third consecutive Roland Garros crown next month.