2023-06-02 09:38:36
For the second time in three years, there is no longer any Frenchman in contention for the third round at Roland-Garros, where they were 28 engaged in the main draws in singles. A setback for French tennis.
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At the start was hope, very quickly confronted with a principle of reality: for the second time in three years, there is no longer any French in the running as the third round begins at Roland-Garros. Before 2021, such a failure had never hit French tennis. The new management team of the French Tennis Federation (FFT) has set up a system for detecting future talent on a broader base of young players, but the road still seems long before a nugget shines.
This year, however, the story looked good, even if the title seemed objectively out of reach on this fortieth anniversary of Yannick Noah’s victory.
Caroline Garcia was there in the lead, with her status as world No. 5, promising young shoots were expected in the men’s category with Lucas Van Assche and Arthur Fils. In the first days of the tournament were added the epic of Lucas Pouille and the unexpected resurrection of Gaël Monfils, who has lost none of his aura despite his months of absence and the inevitable advance of time (he will be 37 years in September).
In fact, the French novel turned sad very quickly. A little by the force of fate, a little by that of fate, a little by an insufficient level in general or at the time.
This last point applies in particular to Caroline Garcia, again a victim of her mentality. “I had the first set, I had a break (in the second) and from then on things got a little bit out of hand. I got very tense,” she confessed afterward. her defeat in the second round against the Russian Anna Blinkova (56e).
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“The young people, they lack the tennis level”
Disappointing certainly, but not so surprising given its latest results. Garcia has not been able to assume since the start of the season the status acquired last year after reaching the knockout stages at Wimbledon, winning the title in Cincinnati, playing his first Grand Slam semi-final at the US Open and won the year-end Masters. And thus found the Top 5 of the WTA.
“I’m human, I have emotions, there are things going on in your heart, in your head, and you try to manage everything, at the same time as managing an opponent. You do the best you can Today wasn’t up to scratch, neither was the last few weeks,” she admitted.
The next generation, both for men and women, is not there.
“The young people, they lack the tennis level. But a Yannick (Noah) can be inspiring by his mental capacities, his capacity for work”, analyzed for AFP the director of Roland-Garros, Amélie Mauresmo, herself. former world No. 1 and double Grand Slam winner (Australia and Wimbledon 2006), and whose captain in the French Fed Cup team was none other than the 1983 winner of the Parisian tournament.
>> To read also: French tennis in search of glory, 40 years after the triumph of Yannick Noah
Two of these young people, however, Van Assche and Son, “have the potential” to win the Grand Slam “in the future”, according to Ivan Ljubicic, former coach of Roger Federer, who joined the FFT in December 2022 to help the high level.
But the fate was particularly cruel for them since in the best of the cases, they would have faced each other in the second round. But fate, again, put the formidable Spaniard Alejandro Davidovich (34e world) who was responsible for taking out the two players of the 2004 generation in turn.
The “old” Pouille and Monfils held their rank
Fortunately, the “old” Pouille and Monfils played the room drivers and will have marked the 2023 edition.
First of all, Pouille because after dark years fighting physical and psychological injuries, he rediscovered a taste for high-level tennis, for winning, for the overheated atmosphere of the Roland-Garros courts. Without any victory on the ATP circuit since May 2022 and confined to the secondary circuit since the start of the season, he chained three victories in qualifying and one in the first round before giving in to second place against world No. 13 Cameron Norrie, not enough. to blush.
There would even be enough to feed his ambitions with now the “objective” of entering directly into the main draw of the Australian Open next January. Rated 675e at Roland-Garros, he will have to win enough matches to jump nearly 600 places at the ATP.
Monfils, who is also recovering from a foot injury and had not won a match on the ATP circuit since his retirement in August in Montreal, offered him an anthology fight to the public to pass the first round. that he was down 4-0 in the fifth set against Sebastian Baez (42e). But less than 24 hours after its triumph, the 394e world had to withdraw due to a wrist injury. When it doesn’t want…
With AFP
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