LONDON – Before his Wimbledon debut, Pedro Cachin’s phone was blowing up. It was his turn to play Novak Djokovic, and his friends showered him with messages of encouragement. “People were telling me to enjoy it. I told them that of course I was going to enjoy it, because beating him is impossible,” the Argentine told CLAY and a couple of other media in London.
“How impossible?” the people replied. It can’t be that impossible. Nothing is impossible. Nobody has to think like that.
But it his way to have fun. Because Pedro Cachin learned from experience. When he played against Alexander Zverev in Indian Wells.
“I just thought about beating Zverev that time. I came out to the court only focused in the game. And I played terrible, I didn’t enjoy anything, I had a really bad time on the court, I wanted to leave as soon as possible. I was not going to stumble again. With Novak I’m going to play, see what the court is like first. Once I got inside it seemed huge, very different from the ones outside, the grass is a little bit higher. This surface is not my idea one, so I couldn’t expect so many things,” he said.
“Of course I wasn’t chasing the win, but when I saw that I was serving well and he wasn’t returning the way we are used to, I said ‘well, keep enjoying it, don’t put so much pressure on yourself, but trust a little bit more’. Unfortunately, then I didn’t play a good tiebreak”.
After losing to the Serb 6-3, 6-3, 7-6(4) in a match interrupted for more than an hour due to the rain, in a stadium with a retractable roof that took longer than expected to close, Pedro Cachin did not want to keep his feelings to himself: “When I greeted him at the net I thanked him and told him it was the best two hours of my life in tennis”.
Cachin admires Djokovic and doesn’t hide it. “He has done a lot for tennis, and not only for him, but for those of us who play against him and our families. He generates a lot. We are so grateful to Novak,” he acknowledged.
“I didn’t want to insist so much; but for me I would have asked him for a signed jersey, I would have told him how much he has taught us, he has raised the level. He is the GOAT, because the numbers don’t lie. It is spectacular for our sport to have someone who competes at the level of Messi and all these people. I didn’t tell him either, but I’ve worked hard to have an opportunity like this. He comes, competes and wins, but he doesn’t realize how much it changes all of us. He’s too influential,” he said.
The first day in history when Wimbledon starts with two Argentines playing on Centre Court was, for Cachin, one that will change his life. He will play with “one less dream to achieve” from now on.
