Argentine tennis star Diego Schwartzman has had a bad luck of frequently stumbling upon Rafael Nadal at the French Open and he joked about it during his presser at Roland Garros. On Sunday, Schwartzman overcame Andrey Kuznetsov in four sets to advance to the second round at the French Open.
Schwartzman has had three notable French Open so far in his career and each time those runs were ended by record 13-time French Open champion. In 2018, Schwartzman reached his first French Open quarterfinal before losing to Nadal.
Two years later, Schwartzman made the semifinal before he was ousted by Nadal. Last year, Schwartzman lost to Nadal in the quarterfinal.
Schwartzman on not having Nadal in the same quarter
This year, Schwartzman and Nadal could potentially face in the French Open semifinal.
Schwarztman said Nadal is in the bottom part of the draw and then jokingly remarked he is still not sure whether or not Nadal is close to him. “You know, I’ve not seen the draw, so I have no idea who is in my part of the draw.
But here you have the best players too, so every single match it’s a very tough one. I think Rafa it’s in the bottom part of the draw, so no Rafa. But I’m not sure. So I’m not sure if he’s close to me or not,” Schwartzman said, per Sportskeeda.
Schwartzman struggled against Kuznetsov but still managed to escape with a four-set win. “I’m always have confidence, you know. If I feeling okay on court, for me it’s the first step to beat the best players in the world and on tennis right now,” he said.
Schwartzman will have to be at his best in the second round as he plays next tricky Spaniard Jaume Munar. “I have to improve obviously, because today I think I did regular match, you know, but to beat the best guys on tour, I have to improve too many things.
Let’s see what happen on second round against Munar, and then obviously if I win the next match, I have another opportunity to improve,” Schwartzman added.
