Nagal one step away from Cagliari event main draw

New Delhi, April 5 : Indias tennis ace Sumit Nagal overcame the challenge of Italys Andrea Pelegrino 6-3, 6-4 to enter the second and final qualifying round of the $408,800 ATP tennis tournament in Cagliari, Italy.The No.

139-ranked Nagal, took one hour and twenty-eight minutes to get past his Italian rival, ranked No.283 on the ATP, and set up a final-round clash on Monday against Maxime Janvier of France, who defeated Maxime Cressy of the US in straight sets.The Cagliari tournament --- also called ATP Cagliari --- has a qualification phase where lower-ranked players have to compete to participate in the main tournament.

A total of 40 players compete in the tournament of which 24 get direct entries into the main tournament, while the others take the qualification route.Exactly a month ago, the 23-year-old Nagal who hails from Jaitpur in Haryana, had registered the biggest win of his ATP career when he had stunned world No.22 and second seed Cristian Garin of Chile 6-4, 6-3 to make it to the quarter-finals of the Argentina Open ATP 250 tournament in Buenos Aires.Nagals dream run in the tournament had ended when he had gone down fighting to Spains world No.46 Albert Ramos-Vinolas 6-4, 2-6, 5-7 in a two-and-a-half-hour slugfest.The Indian, who had made it to the US Open second round in 2020, had started as a qualifier in Buenos Aires before making it to the main draw.