Miami Masters 1000, day 1: Bagnis has passed his debut and will be the rival of Alcaraz, number 1 in the world ranking

With two big news for Argentina, the Miami Masters 1000: the triumphs of Facundo Bagnis and Guido Pella. the santa fesino, 100th in the standings, entered the second round beating the Brazilian 6-3, 1-6 and 6-4 Felipe Meligeni Alves, 164th and coming from the rankings, and thus celebrated his first victory in the main draw of an ATP this season. Now he will have a very difficult task: he will face the Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz, number one in the world. Meanwhile, the Bahian, 581st in the standings, is back from a difficult match and beat the Peruvians 1-6, 6-3 and 6-2 John Paul Varillas88th.

Bagnis hadn’t won a match on the world’s premier tennis circuit since early August, when he decisively defeated the Mexican Ernesto Escobedo on his debut in Los Cabos. After that win, he lost to the Lithuanian in the round of 16 Ricarda Berankis.

Since then, he has tacked falls in his debut in US Open (after passing the previous phase), at the end of 2022; and already in this 2023, the first wheel of the Australian Open, Cordoba, Rio de Janeiro (even after passing the qualy) e Santiago de Chile. Meanwhile, he said goodbye in the standings of auckland AND Buenos Aires. So this year he has amassed a record of 0-5, also counting the fall in the Qualifiers of Davis Cup in view of Emil Ruusuvuori.

Inside Tour of the challenger, the second tier of men’s tennis, has however achieved great performances. Since her stay in New York at the end of August, she has reached the semifinals at the Villa María competition and the quarterfinals in Buenos Aires and Campinas, champion shouted to Ambato (Ecuador) and then embarked on a quarterfinal in Montevideo, the final in Sao Leopoldo and other quarterfinals in Temuco (Chile). This is how 2022 ends on the 89th step of the ranking. In March he also said goodbye in the quarterfinals of a tournament in the Chilean capital.

Finally, in Miami, he cut a long drought at the ATP level. Now he will try to give the big blow against Alcaraz, which comes from winning the title in Indian Wells and recovering the number one in the world.

It will be the second game they will play on tour. Last year, they met in the quarterfinals of Umag, with a 6-0 and 6-4 victory for the Spaniards. Before that they had played in the Challengers de Cordenons 2020 and Oeiras 2021, in both cases also with a victory for Carlitos.

The 19-year-old from Murcia must repeat last year’s celebrations in Miami, when he beat the Norwegian Casper Ruud in the final – to stay on top of the world rankings. If he doesn’t keep the crown, he will lose the top again Novak Djokovicabsent in this race because he was unable to enter the United States because he was not vaccinated against Covid-19.

“I was uncomfortable, it was very windy. Very commendable for carrying it forward, with a lot of attitude and a lot of head. I hope to improve for the next one,” Bagnis analyzed in a chat with ESPN. “Now have fun against Alcaraz. In this type of match you have to give your best, you absolutely don’t want to be the number 1 sparring partner. But I have nothing to lose, there are two levels of difference between him and me, I think I’ll be more fluent “.

Pella – who entered the tournament thanks to a protected classification, since he is back on track after missing most of last season with a knee injury – was less than more against Varillas, 88th.

After a first set much more fought than the one that marked the result, the Argentine began to build a comeback. With a large part of the public against – after the victory, he said that there were supporters of his rival who disrespected him and annoyed him a lot – the man from Bahia raised the bar in all aspects of the game and took the initiative.

He was thus able to set the pace and was able to win the second and third sets with a good margin, to move on to the second round, in which he will face the Canadian Denis Shapovalov24th seed.

Pella added his third win so far this year, in which he had already won matches in Córdoba and Indian Wells, last week.

The other side of Bagnis’ victory was the fall of Pedro Cachin. The Cordovan, 63rd in the world rankings, was unable to beat the Hungarian Marton Fucsovics, 74th, who beat him 6-4 and 7-6 (7-2) in one hour and 45 minutes and entered the second round. In that case, the European will clash with the Danish Rune Holgerseventh favourite.

In addition to Bagnis, Cachín and Pella, there will be five other Argentines in Miami. Francis Cerundoloseeded 25, awaits the Spanish Jaume Munar or the American in the second round Aleksandar Kovacevic, who entered as a lucky loser. Sebastian BaezOn the 27th he will meet the Chilean Cristian Garín, coming from qualifying, or the American Marcos Giron. AND diego schwartzmann31, with the British Kyle Edmund or the Chinese Yibing Wu.

While, Frederick Coria (67th classified) will face the Czech Jiri Lehecka (44th) in the first round e Thomas Etcheverry (73rd) will collide with the Russian Pavel Kotov, who came out of the previous stage.