Carlos Alcaraz opens up about his ‘feud’ with coach Juan Carlos Ferrero

Carlos Alcaraz won the Rotterdam Open over the weekend and in the process he beat his coach Juan Carlos Ferrero on two accounts.

World No 3 Alcaraz defeated Alex de Minaur in the ATP 500 final in the Netherlands to lift his first trophy of the 2025 tennis season, which was also his maiden indoor title.

Before the tournament, the four-time Grand Slam winner was 25-12 at indoor events, but he took his career tally to 30-12 with his title run.

Playing in Rotterdam for the first time, Alcaraz also notched up an achievement that eluded his coach Ferrero as he became the first Spaniard to win the event in its 52-year history.

Ferrero finished runner-up to Lleyton Hewitt in 2004 while the great Rafael Nadal lost the 2009 final against Andy Murray.

And he took delight in getting one over his coach – who was not in Rotterdam last week as Alcaraz was accompanied by his other mentor Samuel Lopez – in their friendly “feud”.

“I am very happy to be the first Spaniard to win here, and to have beaten Juan Carlos, with whom we always have a feud,” he joked afterwards.

“In general, I am very satisfied to have put my name alongside the winners of this tournament, where there are great legends of our sport who have played and won it.”

Those legends include Roger Federer and Arthur Ashe, who both won it three times, while the likes of Stefan Edberg and Jimmy Connors won it twice.

Alcaraz also moved ahead of his coach in terms of most ATP Tour singles titles won as the Rotterdam trophy was his 17th at the top level while Ferrero won 16 titles during his career.

He is now level with Alex Corretja for most titles won by a Spanish man in the Open Era with Carlos Moya (20) just ahead of them and David Ferrer on 27.

The legendary Manuel Orantes is second with 36 while Nadal is way ahead in front with 92.

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Alcaraz, though, still has time on his side and he has moved to 17-5 in all finals with six titles coming on hard courts (five outdoor and one indoor), eight on clay and three on grass.

“I think it’s [a matter of] time that I’ll get into the top of the rankings of players on indoor court, I’m sure about it,” the 21-year-old said. “I have to improve a few things that I was working on, the serve is one of them, I think everybody knows that.

“I’m not hiding the fact that the players who have big serves and big shots from the baseline are also dangerous but I think I will reach that level for sure.”

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