Match Report
\n Cerundolo continues impressive ‘Golden Swing’ in Santiago, Nava breaks American drought<\/p>\n
Nava becomes first American quarter-finalist in tournament history, Baez wins<\/p>\n
February 26, 2026<\/p>\n
Getty Images<\/p>\n
Francisco Cerundolo won the ATP 250 title in Buenos Aires earlier this month.
\n By Sam Jacot<\/p>\n
Top seed Francisco Cerundolo<\/a> earned his sixth clay-court win of the season on Thursday at the BCI Seguros Chile Open<\/a> in Santiago. The Argentine recorded an opening-round 6-2, 6-2 triumph against Elmer Moller<\/a> to reach the quarter-finals at the ATP 250 event.<\/p>\n Cerundolo lifted the trophy on home soil in Buenos Aires for the first time earlier this month, a moment which the Argentine described as the ‘best moment of his career so far’. After a second-round exit in Rio de Janeiro, the World No. 19 was dominant throughout his 71-minute win against Moller.<\/p>\n “I grew up my whole life playing on clay,” Cerundolo said. “I developed my game on clay, so I try to always do [well] on this surface. I have been doing better and better every year. I am super happy with my level and how I have been playing the last week and this year. I am feeling really good on clay.”<\/p>\n You May Also Like: Hometown hero Cerundolo wins Buenos Aires title in \u2018best moment of career so far\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n In the pair’s first Lexus ATP Head2Head meeting, the 27-year-old won 89 per cent of his first-serve points and did not face a break point, according to Infosys ATP Stats.<\/p>\n The Argentine will next play Emilio Nava<\/a> after the 24-year-old defeated Paraguayan qualifier Adolfo Daniel Vallejo<\/a> 7-5, 6-3 to become the first American quarter-finalist in tournament history. The World No. 79 is also the first American man to reach a tour-level quarter-final on South American clay since Rajeev Ram<\/a> in 2017 in Quito.<\/p>\n Nava upset the former No. 6 player in the PIF ATP Rankings Matteo Berrettini in his first match at the ATP 250 event and then produced a clean-hitting display to down Vallejo and reach his second ATP Tour quarter-final.<\/p>\n In other second-round action on Thursday, Sebastian Baez successfully bounced back from a first-round exit in Rio de Janeiro, when he defeated home hope Cristian Garin 7-6(2), 1-6, 7-5 in a clash of former champions. With the victory, the 2024 winner marched into his fifth consecutive quarter-final at the ATP 250 clay-court event. <\/p>\n \u201cEverything [is special here], the people, the tournament, the conditions,\u201d Baez said. \u201cThe crowd today was good because I played a Chilean guy. Thank you for the respect.” <\/p>\n The Argentine will face Alejandro Tabilo or countryman Thiago Agustin Tirante for a place in the semi-finals. <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Match Report Cerundolo continues impressive ‘Golden Swing’ in Santiago, Nava breaks American drought Nava becomes first American quarter-finalist…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502073,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[442],"tags":[49,48,82,593],"class_list":["post-502072","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=502072"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502072\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}