India’s Sumit Nagal missed a potential clash against Rafael Nadal when he lost to Mariano Navone 6-4, 6-2 at the Nordea Open in Bastad in Sweden on Thursday.
Nagal, the highest-ranked Indian tennis player, would have potentially met Rafael Nadal in the quarterfinals but the fourth-seeded Argentine Navone proved too tough to tackle.
The Indian beat Elias Ymer, who was given a wild card, in the round-of-32 on Wednesday.
Nagal, ranked 68 in the world, started off well against Navone and even took a 2-0 lead by breaking Navone’s first service game. But Navone, ranked 36 in the world, came back from behind to win the next five consecutive games to take a 5-2 lead in the first set.
Just when it seemed like the Argentina player would run away with the set, Nagal broke his opponent’s serve to make it 3-5 and then held on to his serve to make it 4-5.
Navone, who was serving for the set, was two break points down but the Indian made a couple of unforced errors to hand the set to the Argentine at 6-4.
Navone came all guns blazing in the second set and Nagal was left playing catch-up. The Indian even saved four match points but the distance to claw back into the game seemed very far off as the Argentine closed the match in his favour soon after.
Nagal has had a good season this year and he became the first Indian in five years to play in the main draw of all four Grand Slams.
He beat Alexander Bublik in the first round at the Australian Open, his best performance at a Grand Slam till date, and was ousted in the second round.
Nagal lost his first round matches at the French Open and the Wimbledon and is set to make another main draw appearance at the US Open later next month.
He will also become the second Indian to play in back-to-back Olympics when he takes to the courts at Roland Garros when the Paris Olympics 2024 gets underway in the French capital city next week.
