“El Peque” Diego Schwartzman shoots past “Rublo” Andrey Rublev, goes undefeated on UTS Day 1 in Frankfurt

“El Peque” Diego Schwartzman capped off an undefeated day on Friday at UTS Frankfurt.

Diego Schwartman, El Peque, at UTS Frankfurt | © UTS / Tennis Majors

September 15, 2023

Diego Schwartzman – aka “El Peque” – has raced out of the starting gates at UTS Frankfurt. The Argentinian, making his third UTS appearance, raced to the top of the table on Friday in Frankfurt, completing a perfect day with his second win of the day, 14-10, 16-13, 7-16, 15-8, over “Rublo” Andrey Rublev.

Schwartzman, who blanked “La Monf” Gael Monfils in Friday’s first match at the Süwag Energie Arena in Frankfurt, 3-0, plowed through the first two quarters against a frustrated Rublev to put the world No 6 on the brink of defeat.

Things were tight until Schwartzman converted his three-point card at the end of the quarter to give himself an insurmountable 15-8 lead. Rublev rallied back to close to 15-13 but Schwartzman closed the quarter on his sixth quarter point to take the 2-0 lead to the bench.

Rublev’s frustrations hit a peak

Rublev, who tried unsuccessfully to break his racquet over his knee several times, was in no mood to don the headset and chat with UTS commentators after the quarter, but he managed to make us all laugh nevertheless.

Here is a sample of the terse dialogue:

What’s going on in the mind of Andrey Rublev? “Nothing”

What did your coach tell you? “I’m not going to tell you.”

Are you enjoying UTS? “Not at all”

Are you going to win the next quarter? “Looks like no.”

A temporary turnaround for “Rublo”

Though distraught, Rublev found a way to turn things around in the third quarter as he played extremely well and won 16 of 23 points to avoid elimination.

But El Peque kept pushing and took the play to Rublev in the final quarter as he clinched his victory and made it six out of seven victorious quarters on the day in Frankfurt.

VAMOS! 🇦🇷 Two wins for El Peque at #UTSFrankfurt pic.twitter.com/mZuXYN5tyS
— UTS Tour (@uts_tour_) September 15, 2023

New coach in Diego’s corner

“I lost a quarter but even in that one I felt great, so it was a very good day for me,” he said. The Argentinian appears to be profiting from a new partnership with fellow ATP player Bruno Tiberti. He’s happy to be working with the 34-year-old and benefitting from new chemistry.

“This year was not the best,” he said. “These kinds of wins are important for me – every win right now is very important for me.”

The current world No 134 (former world No 8) hopes that today’s sterling performance against the world No 6 will give him confidence for the rest of the season.

“I think I did more winners than him,” he said. “I was ripping the forehand. I need to continue like this, aggressive, because when I start to not move my hand, my level is going down.”

His coach believes Schwartzman is doing the right things as well.

“He needs to stay aggressive. [Rublev] doesn’t like to be on the defensive side so if you can take him there [it’s good]. He has to keep trusting his game,” said Tiberti.

“He was hitting well, he was dominating the game – I was very happy to see it.”