Weeks 22 & 23 - French Open (Roland-Garros) - Paris, France (clay) - main draw

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Weeks 22 & 23 - French Open (Roland-Garros) - Paris, France (clay) - main draw

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Brilliant to serve Gael serve and volley as he was serving for the match

brendan · Strong Club Player

Djokovic v Sandgren coming up. Just out of interest, is there a way that both players can lose a match?

the addict · Tennis legend

brendan wrote:
Djokovic v Sandgren coming up. Just out of interest, is there a way that both players can lose a match?

Fingers crossed - neither are players I want to watch.

Stircrazy · Tennis legend

brendan wrote:
Djokovic v Sandgren coming up. Just out of interest, is there a way that both players can lose a match?

Oh would that that were possible! disbelief

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Only 3/18 French players has reached R2 at RG. This is the lowest number in the Open Era!
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Quentin Moynet
@QuentinMoynet
· 11m
Sur les 18 Français présents au premier tour de Roland-Garros dans le tableau masculin, ils ne sont que trois (Monfils, Gasquet et Couacaud) à s'être qualifiés pour le deuxième tour.

C'est le pire bilan des Bleus depuis le début de l'ère Open en 1968.
lequipe.fr/Tennis/Article/Trois-francais-au-deuxieme-tour-le-pire-bilan-du-tennis-masculin-a-roland-garros-dans-l-ere-open/1258113

the addict · Tennis legend

Stircrazy wrote:
brendan wrote:
Djokovic v Sandgren coming up. Just out of interest, is there a way that both players can lose a match?
Oh would that that were possible!

Well I suppose one could lose, and the other could swat a ball into the crowd in clelbration - and hit an official ..........

Nah, it'll never happen.

flamingowings · All-time great

JonH comes home wrote:
Only 3/18 French players has reached R2 at RG. This is the lowest number in the Open Era!
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Quentin Moynet
@QuentinMoynet
· 11m
Sur les 18 Français présents au premier tour de Roland-Garros dans le tableau masculin, ils ne sont que trois (Monfils, Gasquet et Couacaud) à s'être qualifiés pour le deuxième tour.

C'est le pire bilan des Bleus depuis le début de l'ère Open en 1968.
lequipe.fr/Tennis/Article/Trois-francais-au-deuxieme-tour-le-pire-bilan-du-tennis-masculin-a-roland-garros-dans-l-ere-open/1258113

Sure, this looks pretty bad but context matters. Gasquet won against a fellow Frenchman. Tsonga has a chronic back problem. Pouille is just back from surgery. Paire and Simon are woefully out of form, PHH isn't much better; Simon has talked about retiring I think and both have spoken about the change to the tour post-covid. Definitely a few surprises for sure (Humbert, Mannarino/Bedene could've gone either way). The majority of the French players I think were lower ranked than their opponents.

-- Edited by flamingowings on Tuesday 1st of June 2021 09:09:40 PM

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Yes, but that context makes it even worse, to the French, at least.

The fact that they are all injured (because they're 'so old') or out of form (again coz 'so old') or playing other French people, or lower ranked, just all adds to the general sh*tshow (in French opinion).

Being lower ranked is the whole problem, not a reason to be cheerful.

The FFT have seen this coming for years, mind. Last year was dire. This is even worse. The women are OK-ish but no more and certainly a long way off making up for it.

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Just 22 mens seeds survived round 1, 10 going out.

At least Evo wasnt alone.

Ace Ventura · Tennis legend

3/18 obviously isn't great, but impressive numbers at least. I know around 7 (so roughly 40%) will be MDWCs, but imagine having 18 British men (or women) in the 128 player draw for Wimbledon - we'll be pretty lucky if there's 6 of each.

JonH comes home · Tennis legend

Ace Ventura wrote:
3/18 obviously isn't great, but impressive numbers at least. I know around 7 (so roughly 40%) will be MDWCs, but imagine having 18 British men (or women) in the 128 player draw for Wimbledon - we'll be pretty lucky if there's 6 of each.

i guess it is all relative - our expectations are a lot lower

but you are right, if this was the uk and we had 18 players, 11 of which might be da or qualies entrants, and 3 of those got through to the second round, we would probably be pretty good about it. looking at the 3 in uk equivalents though, monfils, gasquet and couacard, our equivalent might be andy murray, liam broady and someone like ryan peniston in the second round - id take that now if it was offered

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Could we claim back Ali Bedene? Who won his first round nicely?

(Think Gasquet might be a bit miffed if he's being compared to Liam

but you were struggling for possibly players, Jon, so I take your point).

The problem for the FFT is that if your three are Gael, Gasquet and Enzo - well, Gael and Gasquet are living on borrowed time, I love them both and hope they do well but I really doubt they're in the FFT's three-year plan (let alone their five-year one). And Enzo was (probably) just a nice fluke.

indiana · Tennis legend

Coup Droit wrote:
Nice that the Finnish-Swiss qualifier, Laaksonen, also got a win.

Aged 29, he's made R2 in a Grand Slam a couple of times before. But this is a big win for him, and always nice for a qualifier.

Laaksonen has now beaten (11) Bautista Agut in 4 sets in R2!

He will play (23) Khachanov or Nishikori in R3.

Coup Droit · Tennis legend

Good on the completely unheard of, unsung Swiss tennis player

He must feel truly like a spare part at most Swiss tennis events - pleased for him !