You do realize the humid conditions affected him today right? Alot can change in 2 days. I believe if he serves like he did in the Nakashima match he can defeat Alcaraz in 4 sets. All depends on the conditions and if they decide to close the roof
Yes, I am aware that it's humid in New York. I am also aware that heavy humid conditions can effect tennis performance. However, I'm not sure it can totally explain Sinner's ragged serving performance tonight.
Most of his double faults tonight were from hitting his second serve long. Heavier conditions usually help you control spin better, but that wasn't happening. I believe that long serves can come from errant tosses where the ball is getting too far out in front, so you aren't able to get under the ball enough to impart topspin properly. Alternatively, one of the commentators mentioned they felt his backswing on the serve was a bit out of synch tonight, which was effecting his rhythm and feel. Whatever the case, it was a bad serving performance compared to his earlier rounds:
1st round: 16 aces, 5 double faults, 57% first serve percentage. Broken 3 times over 5 sets.
2nd round: 12 aces, 4 double faults, 55% first serve percentage. Broken once in 3 sets.
3rd round: 16 aces, 4 double faults, 60% first serve percentage. Broken twice in 4 sets.
4th round: 5 aces, 14 double faults, 46% first serve percentage. Broken 8 times in 5 sets. (YiKES!)
Clearly, he needs to figure out what happened tonight and serve more like he did the first three rounds when he plays Alcaraz. He can't expect to give so many free points and games away against that caliber of player. Lucky for him tonight, Ivashka's serve wasn't giving him too many problems and he was able to break him 12 times.