Wimbledon has lost its prime attraction, with two-time champion Carlos Alcaraz announcing that he is withdrawing from the entire grass-court season because of his injured wrist.
Alcaraz posted on X: “My recovery is going well and I feel much better, but unfortunately I’m still not ready to be able to play, and that’s why I have to withdraw from the grass-court swing at Queen’s and Wimbledon.
“They’re two really special tournaments for me and I’ll miss them loads. We keep working to get back as soon as possible!”
The injury – which is described as inflammation of the tendon sheath in the right wrist – flared up just over a month ago in Barcelona, after Alcaraz had completed an otherwise routine victory over Finland’s Otto Virtanen.
Alcaraz’s team have since taken an ultra-conservative approach, knowing that wrist problems can easily become chronic. Previous grand-slam champions such as Juan Martín del Potro and Dominic Thiem have suffered from career-limiting issues in that area.
In Alcaraz’s absence, Jannik Sinner has extended his dominance over the men’s tour to the point where he is a prohibitive favourite to win next week’s French Open. The same will now be true of Wimbledon, where Sinner defeated Alcaraz in four sets in last year’s final.
Mi recuperación va por buen camino y me siento mucho mejor, pero desgraciadamente aún no estoy listo para poder jugar y por eso tengo que renunciar a la gira de hierba en Queen’s y Wimbledon. Son dos torneos realmente especiales para mí y los echaré mucho de menos. Seguimos… pic.twitter.com/6IL0APkv5G
— Carlos Alcaraz (@carlosalcaraz) May 19, 2026
Alcaraz, 23, has won seven grand-slam titles in total: Wimbledon in 2023 and 2024, the French Open and US Open titles twice and the Australian Open once.
The news will cast a shadow over the grass-court season, because the so-called “Sincaraz” rivalry has been the central theme of men’s tennis for the past couple of years.
These two men are so far superior to their rivals that they shared the four majors equally in 2024 and 2025, although they did not start to meet each other regularly at grand-slam level until last year’s French Open, where Alcaraz saved three match points to win a five-set thriller that ranks alongside the greatest matches ever contested. Following that, they met again in the Wimbledon and US Open finals, claiming one title apiece.
Within this pairing, Alcaraz is probably the more popular with global tennis fans. Not only does he show greater emotion on the court than the poker-faced Sinner, but he is renowned for his ability to produce magical shots out of nowhere, whether hitting around the net-post or scooping lobs into play with his back turned towards his opponent.
It is possible that Alcaraz – who won January’s Australian Open by defeating Novak Djokovic in four sets – will now target August’s US Open for his next push. Should Sinner clean up at the French Open and Wimbledon – a challenging double that Alcaraz himself managed to pull off in 2024 – then Alcaraz will need to triumph in New York to make this the third successive season with a 2-2 grand-slam split.
Wimbledon, meanwhile, will rumble on regardless, even if there will be sadness at the absence of such a bankable star. Much of the intrigue is likely to be redirected towards the women’s event, where world No 1 Aryna Sabalenka will be determined to improve on a frustrating record: she has reached the semi-finals three times but lost on each occasion.
It has already been a season of numerous fitness worries, with the many affected players including Britain’s most talented stars Jack Draper and Emma Raducanu. But the box-office appeal of grass-court tennis is likely to remain strong, even in a World Cup year, and despite the depleted field.