Two Argentine celebrations left a new day of competition in the ATP 500 de Barcelona. Facundo Díaz Acosta y Tomas Etcheverry They won their matches without giving up sets and advanced to the round of 16 of the traditional Count of Godó.
Díaz Acosta continues to break barriers on the ATP circuit. The 23-year-old from Buenos Aires, who is experiencing the best moment of his career, scored a great victory against the Croatian Borna Coric, 15th favorite in the tournament, 6-2 and 7-5. And he secured a jump in the rankings to enter the top 50 for the first time in his career.
It took one hour and 37 minutes of play for the man born in La Lucila to beat Coric, 32nd in the ranking, and get into the top 16 of the competition. Now wait for the winner of the duel between the Hungarian Fabian Marozsan and the french Luca Van Assche.
Díaz Acosta was a steamroller at the start of the match and took a 5-0 lead in the opening set. Coric finally reacted and, after closing the distance with his serve, recovered a break and scored to make it 2-5. But the Santiago 2023 Pan American champion did not lose focus, he responded with a new break and closed the partial.
The second chapter was more even, with longer and more disputed games. And the Buenos Aires native had to endure the pressure from the Croatian, who did not want to say goodbye to the Catalan competition so early. Only in the 12th game, Facu – who will climb, at least, to 49th place in the ranking – had a chance to break and he did not waste it. He stole serve from his rival and sealed the victory.
It was his first victory outside Argentina against an opponent ranked among the best 50 in the world. Last year, he beat him in Buenos Aires a Federico Coria (then 49th) on debut. And in the last edition of the Buenos Aires tournament, in which he reached the final, he surprised in the round of 16 Francisco Cerúndolo (22°).
At the close of the day, Etcheverry, 13th seed, won 7-5, 6-2 against the Dominican Nick Hardt229th in the ranking and coming from the classification, in a match that cost him more in the first set, but which ended up closing with authority in one hour and 45 minutes
The player from La Plata, 30th in the ranking, was the first to break in an even first set to go ahead 4-3, but he gave up serve and the score was once again level at 4-4. He just took advantage again at the close of the set (6-5) and was able to close it in the next game.
Etcheverry settled better in the second and, after surviving a very tough game of 16 points to tie 2-2, gained confidence and headed towards victory. He won four games in a row (with two breaks in between) and sealed the 6-2.
Etcheverry recovered his smile on his debut in Barcelona. Photo TV Capture
The player from La Plata, who had just suffered a tough defeat in the second round of Montecarlo ante Stefanos Tsitsipas (6-1 and 6-0), he regained his smile. And on top of that the picture opened, because the American Brandon Nakashima gave the blow against the Russian Andrey Rublevsecond favorite, and will be his rival in the round of 16.
One of the bad news for Argentine tennis was the new setback of Diego Schwartzman, which still has not been reunited with its best version. He Littlerelegated to 142nd place in the rankings after a couple of seasons of poor results, fell 6-1 and 6-2 against the Serbian Dusan Lajovic59th in the ATP, in a pending match in the first round.
The Buenos Aires native, former world number eight and semi-finalist in Roland Garros In 2020, he had gotten into the main draw by overcoming the classification, in which he achieved his first two wins of the season on clay.
“Bad day, but let’s see how positively tennis is improving in the last tournaments with several victories. Let’s continue adding confidence and rhythm at this stage,” he commented on his social networks after the defeat, which left his record at 0-5 from 2024 in main draws of ATP tournaments.
He also said goodbye to the tournament Sebastian Baezeighth favorite, who was left wanting to advance to the third round after losing to the Italian Matteo Arnaldi40th in the ranking, 5-7, 7-6 (10-8) and 6-2.
The Buenos Aires native, 19th in the world and currently the best ranked Argentine, added his fourth consecutive defeat on the circuit. His last victory was achieved in his debut in Indian Wells against the Italian Fabio Fognini. He was then eliminated from that tournament in the third round by Taylor Fritz (12th) and then had falls in Miami, Monte Carlo and, now, Barcelona.
Defeat of Ugo Carabelli in Munich
It was debut and farewell for Camilo Ugo Carabelli in it ATP 250 de Munich, another of the clay tournaments taking place this week. The Buenos Aires player, 109th in the ranking, lost 7-6 (7-2) and 6-2 with the Colombian Daniel Galan93rd, in the first round of the German competition.
Ugo Carabelli – who only won one match in ATP tournaments (not counting the qualifications) this season, in Buenos Aires – had the chance to take a big step in his goal of getting into the main draw at Roland Garros. But the fall against Galán left him, for now, outside the direct entry list.
2024-04-16 20:33:15
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