File photo of Sumit Nagal.© X (formerly Twitter)
India's Sumit Nagal put up a courageous fight against world number seven Holger Rune before losing his rain-affected match in the second round of the Monte Carlo Masters on Thursday. In an impressive display of grit and courage, Nagal threatened to spoil Rune's celebration by winning the second set after the second round match, which was suspended on Wednesday due to rain, resumed. However, in the last set he lost his serve twice. The Indian qualifier was trailing 1-2 against seventh seed Rune in the second set when the heavens opened.
He lost 3-6 6-3 2-6 after battling hard for two hours and eleven minutes at the prestigious clay court event. Nevertheless, it was a memorable tournament for him as he became the first Indian to win a main draw singles match at a Masters event on clay.
Nagal had won a set against the great Roger Federer at the 2019 US Open.
The 26-year-old Nagal dropped his serve in the second game of the final set and fell behind, but immediately broke back and held his own serve to make it 2-2. However, he lost his serve again in the sixth game and the match was decided there.
On the clay court of Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, he first humiliated eight seed Flavio Cobolli in the qualifying match, and then third seed Facundo Diaz Acosto to reach the main draw of the tournament.
India's singles standard-bearer stunned Italian Matteo Arnaldi in the first round with a 5-7, 6-2, 6-4 victory.
Meanwhile, India's Rohan Bopanna and his Australian partner Matthew Ebden had lost their round of 16 men's doubles match to Croatia's Mate Pavic and El Salvador's Marcelo Arevalo on Wednesday.
They lost 3-6 6-7 (6-8).
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