Tournament director uses tactic he’s not done since Roger Federer was playing to get Carlos Alcaraz to commit to his event

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Carlos Alcaraz is currently gearing up for the first major of the 2025, as he bids to become the youngest man in history to complete the Career Grand Slam at the Australian Open.

Alcaraz lost an exhibition match against Alex de Minaur in Melbourne, as he looks to improve his record down under.

Statistically the Australian Open is the Spaniard’s weakest major, with Alcaraz yet to surpass the quarter-final stage.

Looking to make improvements for the 2025 season, Alcaraz has even made a racket change as he looks to conquer the only major that is yet to win.

That is not the only big change that Alcaraz has made this year, as he looks to alter his schedule from previous seasons.

Rotterdam Open Tournament Director uses big budget to get Carlos Alcaraz to play 2025 event

In previous seasons, Alcaraz had headed to South America following the Australian Open for a series of clay court tournaments that are dubbed ‘the golden swing’.

However, the world number three has elected not to do that this year and Alcaraz will also miss Spain’s Davis Cup tie against Switzerland.

Instead, Alcaraz has opted to play at the Rotterdam Open for the first time in his career this year.

Rotterdam tournament director and former Wimbledon champion Richard Krajicek has explained to Nos that he previously elected to give Andy Murray a wildcard two years ago, before Alcaraz signed a three year contract for tournaments in South America.

Krajicek then admitted that he had to use the top end of the budget to acquire Alcaraz, something that had not been done since Roger Federer in 2018.

“His arrival was on top of the normal budget, we were able to make good agreements with him,” said Krajicek. “We don’t do this every year or every two years.

“We only do this in very special cases, such as in 2018 with the arrival of Roger Federer. In any case, ticket sales skyrocketed after we announced the arrival of Alcaraz.”

Krajicek added, “After Federer and [Rafael] Nadal, the public sees that [Jannik] Sinner and Alcaraz are also creating cool things. They have different characters. Alcaraz is the unpredictable top player, Sinner is the cool killer. They play insanely.”

Both Alcaraz and defending champion Jannik Sinner will feature at this year’s Rotterdam Open that features six top players including Daniil Medvedev, Alex de Minaur, Andrey Rublev and Grigor Dimitrov.

Previous winners of the Rotterdam Open

The ATP 500 tournament is one of the more established events in the calendar, with the legendary Arthur Ashe winning the inaugural title back in 1972.

When Krajicek offered Federer top billing for the Rotterdam Open in 2018, the Swiss went onto win a record-equalling third title.

More recently the tournament has seen singles champions including Medvedev, Felix Auger-Aliassime, Rublev and last year’s winner Sinner.

The 52nd edition of the Rotterdam Open will begin on Monday February 3.