2024-07-05 12:15:44
Francisco Comesaña doesn’t want to wake up from his dream week: in his debut in a Grand Slam tournament, the Mar del Plata native beat Australian Adam Walton in five sets after almost four and a quarter hours of play and made it to the third round of Wimbledon, becoming the player with the greatest impact so far in the tournament. In addition, with the fall of Tomás Etcheverry, he is now the only Argentine still in the competition.
Ranked 122 in the world, Comesaña surprised the tennis world with his victory on Tuesday against Russian Andrey Rublev, number six in the ranking. And now he repeated the dose by securing his ticket to the third round in a vibrant and epic match, which was decided in the tie break of the fifth set. The 7-5, 1-6, 6-7 (14-16), 6-1 and 7-6 (10-8) reflects how disputed and changeable the development was, which was decided in Comesaña’s favor by a handful of details in a tie break full of tension against a player better ranked in the ranking and, above all, a specialist on grass.
“It’s the tournament of my dreams, I didn’t want to settle for beating Rublev and today I went for more, and I’m very happy to be in the third round,” said the Argentine to ESPN after the match. “The idea was to enjoy the nerves and having taken it out in the tie-break match makes me very proud, because it was also difficult with the wind at times of tension.”
In addition to his good tennis and personality, the 23-year-old from Mar del Plata showed a very strong head to recover from the loss of the third set in an endless tie break, in which Walton, who had just eliminated Federico Coria, had six wasted opportunities before sealing the set on the seventh opportunity he had. With a cool head, the Argentine maintained his level to take advantage of a loss by the Australian to take the fourth set and start the comeback that he finally achieved.
The serve, which allowed him to hit 19 aces, was Comesaña’s great ally, who will next face Italian Lorenzo Musetti, who beat his compatriot Luciano Darderi in five sets. Thanks to his victory, the Mar del Plata native will rise more than 20 positions in the ranking and return to the Top 100.
The other Argentine who played this Thursday was Tomas Etcheverry (30th), who battled against the Australian Alexei Popyrin but fell 3-6, 6-4, 4-6, 6-4 and 6-3 after three hours and 58 minutes of play. This was a new disappointment for the player from La Plata, who despite having all the weapons to fight the best, is unable to translate it into good results and ends up suffering unexpected defeats against rivals who appear inferior in the preview. Popyrin’s next rival will be the Serbian Novak Djokovic, world number 2 and seven-time Wimbledon champion, who beat the British Jacob Fearnley.
Thus, the only Argentine hope in the race is Comesaña, who was the only one who managed to impose conditions on a grass that was very adverse for the national representatives this season.