PARIS: Sumit Nagal will attempt a final push at the Heilbronn ATP Challenger in Germany, starting June 3, to make the cut for the 2024 Olympic Games.
The tennis cut for the quadrennial Games will be applied at the end of the Roland Garros fortnight.
The Indian, ranked No.94, went out in the first-round to the 18th seeded Russian Karen Khachanov in Paris on Monday.
It’s a draw of 64 for the Olympics, making it tough for the Indian, but with restrictions on number entries per country, as also tournament withdrawals, if Nagal does well at Heilbronn, he may just give himself a fair chance of making the cut.
Nagal will follow the Heilbronn outing with another Challenger (125) in Perugia, starting June 10, after which he takes a break from clay and logs in a training week on grass before playing Wimbledon.
Nagal will have to play the wait-and-watch game for the Olympics.
“It all depends on what the cut will be. The first cut will be very strong, probably in the region of 70,” he said, adding, “we’ll have to see what follows.”
Nagal, who was disappointed with his Roland Garros main draw debut, said the goal was to be able to consistently push players ranked in the top-20.
“He (Khachanov) was playing almost every point with a lot of intensity,” the 26-year-old said. “That’s something I can work on, where you give opponents very few free points, it’s happening quite a bit from my side.”
“The goal is to keep improving,” Nagal said, “keep battling these top-20 players. If I can do that by the end of the year, I will be at the level I want to be competing in. The only way that can happen is to play these kind of players more and more.”
