Marco Trungelliti's 10-hour drive to Roland Garros results in first round win over Bernard Tomic

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  • Trungelliti with his brother, grandma and mother en route to Paris. (Credit: Twitter/@fuebuena)

    The French Open’s greatest feel-good adventure took an even happier turn on Monday as Marco Trungelliti, who drove 10 hours in a car with his brother, mother and grandmother from Barcelona to Paris in order to get into the main draw as a lucky loser, won his first round against Bernard Tomic.

    The affable Argentine had lost in the final round of qualifying to Poland’s Hubert Hurkacz on Friday, and was ninth in line for a lucky loser spot, which made him think it was unlikely he would get into the main draw.

    He left Paris and went back to Barcelona, where he is based, before opportunity struck on Sunday, the opening day of Roland Garros. In a most bizarre and rare scenario, no players had signed in as lucky losers on Sunday, except Egypt’s Mohamed Safwat, who was seventh in line.

    Safwat got into the main draw when Viktor Troicki became the seventh player to pull out of the tournament, but when Nick Kyrgios withdrew later on Sunday, there was no one there to replace him.

  • Mohamed Safwat falls to Grigor Dimitrov on his historic Grand Slam debut at Roland Garros

  • Some players who had lost in qualifying, were already off to play a Challenger in Vicenza, others went home, and a few, like Thanasi Kokkinakis, who fell in the qualifying second round, were on-site practicing at Roland Garros. None of these players thought to sign in for a lucky loser spot that morning and Tomic had no first round opponent.

    There is an order for lucky loser spots (it goes by ranking after the first six are drawn by a lot) but when those high up in the queue don’t sign in, any player who lost in qualifying – irrespective of the round – could have taken the spot vacated by Kyrgios.

    Trungelliti found out around noon on Sunday that he could get into the draw if he makes it to Paris in time for an 11:00am opening round match against Tomic on Monday.

    It was then that his remarkable road trip began – one that was chronicled by his wife on social media and captured the attention of tennis followers worldwide.

    “My grandma was in the shower and I told her, ‘Okay, we go to Paris’. There are many flights cancelled, so I didn’t trust too much. And then there is no train now in France so the best option was always, was just to take the car,” said a smiling Trungelliti addressing a packed main interview room at Roland Garros following his 6-4, 5-7, 6-4, 6-4 win over Tomic.

    He arrived to Paris around midnight, slept for five or six hours, and was at the French Open grounds at 7:30am, ready to sign in and take what was now a highly-coveted lucky loser spot. Needless to say multiple players signed in on Monday.

    “It was good, no? It’s beautiful,” added the Argentine.

    Trungelliti’s grandmother Dafne, or ‘abuelita’ as he refers to her, turns 89 next month. She was happy to join the ride but he admits she has no clue about tennis.

    “She has no idea how to count it (the score). And actually, she told me that she didn’t know that it was the end of the match until everybody was clapping,” he said with a laugh. “She’s amazing.”

    Did he expect his odyssey to get this much attention?

    “I think the main reason is my wife, because I have no network, so I have no Instagram, no nothing. She did it, but we didn’t know at that time that it was going to be like this,” said the 28-year-old.

    Ex-top-10 player, Latvian qualifier Ernests Gulbis, who won his opener against Gilles Muller on Monday, was told about Trungelliti’s story. Would he drive for 10 hours to get into a Grand Slam main draw?

    “Of course, it’s such a great bonus. You have nothing to lose then. To play in main draw in a Grand Slam, you don’t drive, you crawl here,” Gulbis said with a chuckle.

    The lucky loser saga is interesting on multiple fronts.

    Firstly, the fact that a whopping eight lucky losers made it into the main draw is unusual. But the new rule that allows injured players to withdraw from Grand Slams while guaranteeing them half of the first-round prize money. The other half goes to the lucky loser who takes their place in the draw.

    The rule, implemented from the start of this year is designed to discourage injured players from taking to the court, knowingly unfit, then retiring a few games in just to collect first-round prize money.

    While only two lucky losers made it into the men’s singles draw at the Australian Open this year, that number rocketed up to eight in Paris, which implies, the rule is actually working.

    Germany’s Mischa Zverev was fined $45,000 in Melbourne in January for a poor performance in his first round against Chung Hyeon.

    “Now with the new rule, people will pull out, they make you pull out more or less, with what happened with Mischa Zverev at the Australian Open. They made an example out of it and now everybody is making the right decision I guess,” said former top-10 player Andrea Petkovic when discussing the lucky loser drama taking place at Roland Garros.

    The other interesting part is how little players know about the lucky loser system and how there seems to be a breakdown in communication between the officials at the tournament, and the players.

    I personally was the one who told Safwat on Saturday evening that he was next in, after two players ahead of him got into the draw.

    Trungelliti’s coach only got the idea to encourage his player to call the tournament and ask when he saw Safwat on court, competing against Dimitrov.

    Surely there is a better way for players to be informed about withdrawals.

    Kokkinakis admits he doesn’t know much about how lucky loser situations work.

    “I wish I knew how this worked f***,” tweeted the Aussie when he found out he could have played in the French Open had he signed in.

    Petkovic says the same thing happened at a $100k tournament she played recently, but she never thought she could see it manifest at a Grand Slam.

    “I got a walkover because Genie Bouchard pulled out like an hour before our match and nobody had signed in. And I hadn’t played Challengers in a while so I thought ‘okay, that’s a Challenger thing’. And then I’m here at a Grand Slam and still almost nobody managed to sign in. I just guess it should be a lesson to everybody, you should always sign in, it just doesn’t matter,” said the German.

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