Source: Sports Weekly
Known as the "fifth grand slam", the Indian Wells Men's Singles Qualifier entered the decider round, and the 17-year-old Chinese young player Shang Chengcheng, who held a wild card, went down 6-3 before the next city, because the opponent German Moran chose to retire, thus successfully advancing to the men's singles main tournament, this victory also rewrote a lot of history!
Shang Juncheng became the first Chinese mainland player to enter the Masters from the qualifiers and the first Chinese mainland player to participate in the Masters from abroad, and the past Chinese male players were able to participate in the Masters, all of which were wild cards obtained in Shanghai, and this will also be Shang Chengcheng's debut in the Masters Main Tournament!
The victory of these two qualifiers is also quite difficult for Shang Chengcheng, who is now only 543 in the world ranking, while the Argentine F. Cerundoro, who won in the first round, is a good player in the 100th place, and the second round opponent Moran, although slightly lower in the ranking, is also 128, and just won a challenge championship in Turin last week, which is quite good.
Although the game was not finished, Shang Juncheng played a remarkable performance, he sent out 6 aces in the whole game, even 3 more than the big opponents with a height of 198, and the scoring rate was as high as 93%. In an English interview with the Tennis Channel after the match, Shang said: "Becoming the first Chinese male player to play in the Indian Wells tournament is very special to me, and I am very excited. ”
In addition to creating Chinese tennis history, Shang juncheng also set a new wave of tennis records, becoming the youngest men's singles regular player in Indian Wells in 16 years since Donald Young in 2006; he also became the youngest qualifier to reach the Indian Wells main tournament since the founding of the Masters in 1990; he was also the youngest qualifier to reach the Masters after the 16-year-old Nadal in Hamburg in 2003.
Coincidentally, in an interview after the game, Shang Juncheng also specifically mentioned that he was a super fan of Nadal because he was also a left-handed player, but he also said that his style was more like Djokovic, and he also liked Djokovic's style the most in the tour, it seems that he drew a lot of nutrition from the two giants' predecessors, this time Nadal also participated, I don't know if there is a chance to meet?
In fact, after reaching the top of the youth men's singles world number one last year, Shang Juncheng continued to surprise us, after winning the second place in the us open junior group, he officially turned professional, at the end of September, he participated in the adult competition for the first time, won the ITF Fayetteville championship, and then he also won the world ranking points for the first time, ranking 1041st. In mid-October, Shangcheng won the championship at the ITF Station in Naples and Vero Beach Station in the United States.
At the end of November last year, Shang Juncheng made his ATP Challenge debut at Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, and defeated Uruguayan M. Cuevas for the first time, ending his first season in the professional arena with a world ranking of 669 and winning the title of ITF Junior Men's Singles World Champion.
At the ATP500 Brazil Rio in February this year, Shang Zhencheng won a valuable wild card, which was also his debut in the MAIN ATP Tour, but lost 3-6, 4-6 to Spanish clay player Martinez in the first round, regrettably missing the first victory of his career.
Then back in the United States, Shang Cheng won the ITF Napoli again, which was his fourth ITF level championship in half a year. With 16 points in the Indian Wells main tournament, Shang Juncheng's world ranking will reach the top 500 for the first time, which will undoubtedly become a new hope for the Chinese men's tennis.