Monte Carlo Masters: Sumit Nagal Win Indian Tennis & Became the first Indian to reach the second round

In the Rolex Monte Carlo Masters, India’s top-ranked tennis player, Sumit Nagal, has advanced to the second round. Unseeded 95th-ranked Sumit Nagal has now become the third Indian to reach the main draw of the Monte Carlo Masters.

About Sumit Nagal

• He defeated Italy’s Matteo Arnaldi with the score of 5-7, 6-2, 6-4.
• The win was their first on the ATP Tour and their second overall.
• They had previously met on the Challenger Circuit in Barletta, Italy in 2019, where Nagal also emerged victorious.
• Following this win, Nagal advanced to the second round, where he faced last year’s finalist and world number seven Holger Rune.
• The win also helped Nagal achieve his career-best ranking of 93rd.

Nagal’s performance in 2024:

Nagal’s performance has been better this year 2024. Nagal started the year with her first Grand Slam win at the Australian Open, defeating Alexander Bublik.
After this he won the Chennai Open and entered the top 100 in the ATP rankings. Nagal has achieved his career-best ranking of 95th at the beginning of the second week of April 2024.

First Indian to win a match in Masters 1000 tournament on clay court:

• Nagal became the first Indian man to win a match in a Masters 1000 tournament on clay courts on 8 April 2024. The top-ranked Indian singles player produced a stunning comeback effort to defeat Italy’s Matteo Arnaldi.
• Nagal surprised world number 38 Arnoldi Ko in the first round.
• Nagal achieved his third victory over a player ranked in the top 50 with this.In the following round, Nagal will play Denmark’s Holger Rune, who is currently ranked second.

About Monte Carlo Masters:

Men’s professional tennis players compete at the Monte-Carlo Masters. The French town of Roquebrun-Cap-Martin is the venue. It takes place in April at the Monte Carlo Country Club on clay courts. It is organized every year. This tournament is a part of the nine ATP Tour Masters 1000 events on the ATP Tour.

Indians reached main draw before Sumit:

Before Nagal, Vijay Amritraj in 1977 and Ramesh Krishnan in 1982 had appeared in the main draw of Monte Carlo.
Nagal became the first player since 1990 to play an ATP Masters 1000 match on clay. Nagal, 26, scored 38 runs and will face Denmark’s Holger Rune in the next round on Tuesday, April 9.

What a moment 🇮🇳

Match point as @nagalsumit makes history at the #RolexMonteCarloMasters
pic.twitter.com/ArfGUGEN5V

— Rolex Monte-Carlo Masters (@ROLEXMCMASTERS) April 8, 2024

Early life of Nagal

Born in Jhajjar district of Haryana state of India, Nagal started learning tennis at the age of eight. However, it was not until the age of 10 that he started learning professional tennis and moved to Bengaluru to train at Mahesh Bhupathi’s training academy. He was selected by Bhupathi as part of the Future Initiative program aimed at developing young tennis stars. However, the program was soon discontinued forcing Nagal to fly out of India for future lessons. In order to work with coach Bobby Mahal, Nagal relocated to Toronto.

Demonstration on court

In 2015, Nagal began to rise to fame when he won the 2015 Wimbledon boys’ doubles title with his Vietnamese partner Le Hoang Nam, defeating Reilly Opelka and Akira Santillan in the final. He became the sixth Indian player to win a Junior Grand Slam title.

His performance did not go unnoticed and he was called into the Indian team for the Davis Cup. In the 2016 World Group playoff matchup between India and Spain in New Delhi, Nagal made his debut for India in the Davis Cup.

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Frequently Asked Question of Monte Carlo Masters: Nagal Win Indian Tennis