Alcaraz Defends Tokyo Title

Carlos Alcaraz beat Jiří Lehečka of the Czech Republic 7⁠–⁠6(4), 6⁠–⁠4 on Tuesday, 6 October, in the final of the Japan Open in Tokyo, keeping the title he won there last year. The match took 96 minutes. It is his first title since he won in Doha in February and his third of the season (ATP Tour).

The Japan Open, played this year as the Kinoshita Group Japan Open Tennis Championships, is an ATP 500: a mid-level event on the men’s tour, one level below the Masters series, played on hard courts. Alcaraz, 23, was the top seed and is ranked No. 3 in the world. Lehečka is ranked 19th (ATP Tour; Tennis.com).

Lehečka made the better start inside Ariake Coliseum. He earned three break points, chances to win a game on his opponent’s serve, in the very first game and took the third, so Alcaraz lost his serve straight away. Alcaraz won the break back in the sixth game, sealing it with a clean backhand winner. The set went to a tie-break, the deciding game played when a set reaches six games all, and Lehečka led 4⁠–⁠2. Alcaraz then won five points in a row to take the set (ATP Tour).

In the second set, with his forehand firing, Alcaraz made the only break of serve, in the seventh game, and served out the match. Tennis.com’s match statistics show he won 33 of the 39 points played when his first serve went in and saved two of the three break points he faced. Lehečka hit 7 aces, serves his opponent could not touch, to Alcaraz’s 4 (ATP Tour; Tennis.com).

The record book is why the win travels. The ATP says Alcaraz is only the third man to win the Tokyo title two years running. Stefan Edberg won three in a row from 1989 to 1991, and Pete Sampras won in 1993 and 1994. Both, like Alcaraz, have been ranked No. 1 in the world. The ATP also counts this as Alcaraz’s 21st straight win at ATP 500 level, a run that began after he lost the 2025 Barcelona final to Holger Rune (ATP Tour).

The bigger story is the comeback. Alcaraz completed the career Grand Slam, a title at each of the four majors, by winning the Australian Open, and then won in Doha in February. About two months after his Australian title he injured his right wrist. The injury kept him off the tour for about four and a half months. He came back in late August and reached the quarter-finals of the US Open, where he lost to Ben Shelton in a match that ended at 3:33 a.m. He has worn a compression sleeve on his right arm since his return, and he helped Team Europe win the Laver Cup in September. His last final before this week, at Monte-Carlo in April, ended in defeat by Jannik Sinner (Reuters via The Straits Times; AP via CBC Sports).

His week in Tokyo was not smooth. He needed three sets to beat Alex Michelsen in his opening match. Denis Shapovalov retired injured from their quarter-final, meaning he stopped before the end, with Alcaraz ahead 7⁠–⁠6(3), 2⁠–⁠1. On Monday, in the semi-finals, he lost 16 points in a row and the first set to the qualifier Jaume Munar before winning 5⁠–⁠7, 6⁠–⁠3, 6⁠–⁠1 (ATP Tour; AP via CBC Sports).

Lehečka arrived dangerous. He had beaten Alcaraz in their 2025 quarter-final in Doha. In Tokyo he beat Ugo Humbert 5⁠–⁠7, 6⁠–⁠4, 6⁠–⁠4 and the qualifier Adolfo Daniel Vallejo 6⁠–⁠1, 6⁠–⁠1, then beat Valentin Vacherot of Monaco, the eighth seed, 6⁠–⁠4, 6⁠–⁠2 on Monday. That made six wins in a row, counting his two singles wins for the Czech Republic against the United States in the Davis Cup, the men’s team competition. He was chasing his first title of the season. That run ended against Alcaraz (ATP Tour; AP via CBC Sports; Reuters via The Straits Times).

What a reader can take from Tuesday in Tokyo is simple. Alcaraz lost his serve in the first game and trailed in the tie-break, then won the points that mattered. He keeps the Japan Open title, joins Edberg and Sampras as the only men to defend it, and has his first trophy since February after months away with a wrist injury.