Roland Garros 2022: Pedro Cachín and the end of a good adventure for a tennis worker

Pedro Cachín lowered the curtain on his first adventure in the main draw at Roland Garros. Cordovan, 153rd in the world and lucky loser in the tournament, said goodbye to the second round after beating 6-4, 6-2, 6-4 against French Hugo Gaston74th, in a battle with full stance on Suzanne Lenglen, of which he was a clear visitor. The Argentine can do little against the local left-hander, who is usually bolstered when he plays at home, but he will take away a lot of positive things from his time in the brick dust of Paris.

Gaston-who in 2020 reached round 16 of this contest, ranked 239th-took advantage of the support of the entire public and took the reins of the fight from the start. Born in Toulouse 21 years ago, he had very high effectiveness on his first serve (82 percent, he won 36 of the 44 points he played on that serve) and reached 36 wins (added his rival the 28).

Cachín didn’t give up the defeat, but he made more mistakes than the local team (35 unforced errors against 21) and barely took advantage of one of the five break chances he had. In addition, he delivered 15 break points, of which Gaston made five, to seal the victory in two hours and 3 minutes and advance to the third round, where he will collide with Danish Holger Rune, 19 years old and th -40 in the classification.

For Cordovan, a true tennis worker, the defeat meant a very good end to the tournament. Since the age of 27, he enjoyed playing the Grand Slam main draw for the first time. So far this week, he has qualified in the “big five”, at Wimbledon in 2015; in Paris, London and New York in 2019; and in Australia, last January. But he has not yet passed that previous stage.

His time in Melbourne at the start of the year was his only appearance at the ATP level this season, where he was always moving to challenger-tour. And on that circuit he recently won two titles – in Madrid, on April 17, and in Prague, on May 8 (his third and fourth crowns in that category) – to reach the French Major with confidence and in a good level.

In Paris he was again in the final round of qualifying, but this time luck smiled at him. Because three last-minute casualties opened the door to the main draw and Cordovan didn’t miss the opportunity.

In his debut, he defeated the Slovakian 6-1, 3-6, 6-2 and 6-3 Norbert Gombos, 115th in the world and also came in the previous stage, and earned his first victory in the main draw of a Grand Slam. He didn’t repeat the celebration against Gaston, but in the first round win he got some big prizes for himself.

He scored 61 points -16 for reaching the final round of qualifying and 45 for reaching the second round of the main draw-, which will allow him to climb several places in the rankings up to th 140, his best historical position. On Monday, he will appear for the first time in the top 150.

In addition, he earned 86,000 pounds sterling (just over 108,000 dollars), more than he earned so far in 2022 (nearly 90,000 dollars). An important prize for a player without, for example, a clothing sponsor and this Thursday he played with a plain shirt he bought himself in a local Paris, without a logo, although with patches from a local cosmetic brand that usually sponsors players who play on the main courts in the tournament, as journalist Marcos Zugasti reported on Twitter.

And finally, he fulfilled his dream of playing in Roland Garros, the Grand Slam that, due to tradition and history, has a special taste for Argentine players.

“It’s like this. It’s consistency, consistency and consistency and at some point that something comes along that gives you joy,” he said last year after consecrating himself in the Challenger of Oeiras and cut three years of drought without celebration to that degree.

That phrase is perfectly applicable to what the Cordovans lived through in recent days in Paris, in an edition of the “great” Frenchman that will remain forever in his memory.