Pablo Carreño, a player accustomed to reaching high levels in the Grand Slams, will not feel dizzy when he faces Matteo Berrettini this Sunday (around 10:45, Eurosport) in the second round of the Australian Open. He has already reached where he should for his ranking (21st) and everything he does from now on will be to “take a little step forward” to improve his career and his ranking. But in this game something else is going for him. The Italian, number seven in the world, eliminated his friend and training partner in Villena, Carlos Alcaraz, in the tiebreak of the fifth set in the third round. Thus, the man from Gijón will try to consummate the revenge of Equelite, the Academy run by Juan Carlos Ferrero, coach of the Murcian, and in which both tennis players prepare and live regularly, in the cozy cabins that are in the facilities.
“I will speak with Carlos, with Juan Carlos and with Albert (Molina, his agent and Alcaraz’s agent, because the sensations that are seen on the track are more real. They can tell me things that they have seen from the outside and from the inside,” Carreño confirmed after beating the American Korda in a great match on Friday. That was his 50th victory in Grand Slams, a figure that only 15 other players have reached in Spanish tennis. He has never faced Berrettini and it seems “strange, because he has been on the circuit for a few years.”
From the defeat that Alcaraz suffered, Pablo extracts something positive for his part. “At least, it has left me touched, I hope to be able to take advantage of it”he says half jokingly, half seriously. The Spaniard has been a constant positive in Navy tennis in recent years. Along with Nadal and Bautista, the most representative. Olympic bronze in Tokyo, Davis Cup champion in 2019, winner of six titles, one of them the Hamburg ATP 500 last year, two-time US Open semifinalist and top-10, among other merits. “It’s good to get to the fourth round, but the difference between those at the top is marked by the games they play against each other. And I aspire to be among the top ten again.” This is Carreño, an ambitious tennis player.
Australian Open Men’s Draw.