Tomas Etcheverry and an emotional moment: “I cried on the court” | ATP Tour

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Etcheverry and an emotional moment: “I cried on the field”

The 24-year-old Argentine competes this week at the ATP Challenger 175 in Aix-en-Provence

May 02, 2024

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Tomás Martín Etcheverry left the court in tears amid an emotional scene at his home tournament, the IEB+ Argentina Open in February.

The 24-year-old was forced to retire with a hamstring injury during a thrilling back-and-forth battle with Nicolas Jarry, who had just put the game away. Etcheverry’s family and friends witnessed the hard and abrupt setback suffered by the local favorite in the packed stadium.

“I remember crying on the track… First because I felt terrible pain in my leg, very painful. But I think at that moment, when it happened, I knew inside that I was going to be out of the Tour for a while,” said Etcheverry. to ATPTour.com. “That match was special because if I won it, then in the semifinals it would be against Carlos Alcaraz.”

“It was tough mentally. I watched all the tournaments [por delante]Rio, Chile and I didn’t play there. It’s part of the sport and I know that maybe it can happen again in the future. The truth is that it was my first injury on the Tour.”

Etcheverry returned to action after six weeks away from the field. He quickly found his best form of the season, reaching the semifinals in Houston, his second tournament back. Later, “Tomy” reached the semifinals of an ATP 500 in Barcelona for the first time.

Etcheverry, who will defend the quarterfinals at Roland Garros, is reaping the fruits of an intentional recovery period, during which he enjoyed going to the movies in his spare time.

“I tried to concentrate and do a lot of physical preparation and physiotherapy sessions to recover quickly,” said Etcheverry, seeded second at the Open Aix Provence Credit Agricole, an ATP Challenger Tour 175 tournament taking place this week in the south of France. “My physio Andrés Romañuk, he was with me the entire time and in the six weeks after the injury, we worked together day by day to get to the field as soon as possible.”

Etcheverry, who is one of the three Argentines in the top 30 (Báez, Cerúndolo), wants to improve his hard court game to climb even further in the PIF ATP Rankings. He showed that he is more than capable of winning on that surface at the Australian Open, where he downed Andy Murray and Gael Monfils before falling to Novak Djokovic in the third round.

“I have to improve on the different surfaces of the Tour,” said Etcheverry. “I’m trying to be more aggressive in some moments of the match. If I’m going to play the big tournaments, I need to get some important results there and that will give me the opportunity to improve further in the ranking.”