Boris Becker believes Carlos Alcaraz will be a man under pressure at the Australian Open following his split from his long-time coach Juan Carlos Ferrero as he named his favourite between the Spaniard and Jannik Sinner.<\/p>\n
For the first time in his professional career, Alcaraz won\u2019t have Ferrero in his box at the start of a season as the two parted ways in December<\/a> following seven successful years.<\/p>\n 2003 French Open champion Ferrero mentored the rising star since the age of 15, and together they won six Grand Slams with Alcaraz becoming the youngest world No 1 in the process.<\/p>\n But they announced after the 2025 campaign that they had gone their separate ways without revealing what caused the split, although reports have suggested they failed to come to a new agreement about Ferrero\u2019s compensation<\/a> during contract negotiations, while others claimed there was tension between the coach and Alcaraz\u2019s entourage<\/a>.<\/p>\n The show must go on, though, and Alcaraz appointed Samuel Lopez<\/a>, who joined his coaching team in December 2024, as his new mentor with the Australian Open their first tournament without Ferrero.<\/p>\n Australian Open: How Iga Swiatek and Carlos Alcaraz would make history with Career Grand Slam \u2018double\u2019<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Supercomputer predicts Australian Open winners: Alcaraz & Sabalenka backed as Raducanu given 0.1% chance<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n The world No 1, who is yet to reach a final at Melbourne Park, is one of the favourites to win the title, but Becker feels two-time defending champion Sinner has an edge.<\/p>\n When asked if during an AS and Eurosport interview if Alcaraz can win this year\u2019s season-opening Grand Slam, the former world No 1 replied: \u201cCarlos is good enough to win in Melbourne this year, absolutely.<\/p>\n \u201cFor me, he is the most talented player in the world. I think he is more talented than Sinner, than [Alexander] Zverev. He had a fantastic 2025.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously, he was pushed very hard by Sinner. Right now, I rate them as equals. But you can see it especially in Melbourne: Sinner has won it twice and Alcaraz hasn\u2019t yet.<\/p>\n \u201cThe pressure is on Alcaraz, without Ferrero by his side, to prove something. Is he good enough? Yes. Is he talented enough? Yes. Let\u2019s talk in two weeks and see if we have a new champion in Melbourne. Today, on paper, I would say Sinner is the favourite.\u201d<\/p>\n When asked about Alcaraz\u2019s coaching set-up, Becker stated that the six-time Grand Slam winner is likely to go for a \u201csuper coach\u201d as he named fellow great Rafael Nadal as \u201cthe dream for everyone\u201d.<\/p>\n \u201cThe pressure is on Carlos, as I said. Ferrero is a great coach. Their partnership was excellent,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019ll see any differences in Melbourne; he wants to show that he can win without Ferrero.<\/p>\n \u201cBut in March or April, I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if he had a super coach by his side. The dream for everyone would be Nadal, myself included. Ferrero knows how to win as a coach and a player, and that should not be underestimated by anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n The post Boris Becker explains why \u2018pressure is on Carlos Alcaraz\u2019 and reveals No 1\u2019s \u2018dream\u2019 super coach<\/a> appeared first on Tennis365<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Boris Becker believes Carlos Alcaraz will be a man under pressure at the Australian Open following his split from his long-time coach Juan Carlos Ferrero as he named his favourite between the Spaniard and Jannik Sinner. For the first time in his professional career, Alcaraz won\u2019t have Ferrero in his box at the start of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1627\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tennisring.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Tennis Features<\/h2>\n
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