Baez, Podoroska to lead Argentina at Paris 2024
Argentina has confirmed its team for the Paris 2024 Olympic Tennis Event, with four players set to take part at a Games for the first time on 27 July – 4 August.
World No. 18 Sebastian Baez, No. 27 Francisco Cerundolo, No. 31 Tomas Etcheverry and No. 31 Mariano Navone and doubles players Andres Molteni and Maximo Gonzalez complete the men’s line-up, while Nadia Podoroska and Maria Lourdes Carle form their women’s team.
Cerundolo, Podoroska, Molteni, who all made their Olympic debuts at Tokyo 2020, and Gonzalez, who played with Juan Martin del Potro at Rio 2016, are each set to take part in a Games for the second time.
With nations restricted to a maximum of six entries across each of the men’s and women’s events, doubles world No. 2 Horacio Zeballos misses out on a place in the team. Men's captain Guillermo Coria instead opted for Molteni and Gonazalez – the 2023 Roland Garros quarter-finalists – as their specialist doubles pairing, with singles players Cerundolo and Etcheverrey also forming a pair.
Facundo Diaz Acosta, the world No. 67, also misses out on a place at Paris 2024. The world No. 67 would usually have done enough to qualify, by virtue of both his ranking and by the fact that he won a singles gold medal at the 2023 Pan American Games.
Regional Games champions directly for Paris 2024 if they hold a top 400 ranking – providing the four direct acceptance sports per nation haven’t already been filled.
In this case, Diaz Acosta has been a victim of Mariano Navone’s remarkable rise. Navone, 23, was ranked outside the Top 200 a year ago, but has rocketed into the world’s Top 40 after winning his first six professional titles at ATP Challenger events on clay over the past six months.
Carle, however, does qualify into the women’s singles through the Pan American Games route, having won singles silver at the Games last October.
She will play both singles, and doubles alongside Podoroska, in Paris.