Roland Garros signals end of the road for Grand Slam marathons
For the first time the French Openwill have tie-breaks at 6-6 in deciding sets. Stephen Towers reports
A fter his first-round defeat at Roland Garros two years ago, CorentinMoutet admitted: “I don’t feel anything inmy body right now. I feel empty.”The Frenchman’s reactionwas hardly surprising given that he had just come off court following a 0-6 7-6(7) 7-6(3) 2-6 18-16 defeat to Italy’s Lorenzo Giustino. Thematch had lasted six hours and fiveminutes, though that was still 28minutes shorter than Fabrice Santoro’s first-round victory over Arnaud Clement in 2004, which remains the longest singlesmatch in Roland Garros history. The names of Santoro and Clement are set to remain in the history books for good following the decision by all four Grand Slamtournaments to introduce first-to-10-points tie-breaks at 6-6 in deciding sets.The FrenchOpen, where there had previously been no tie-breaks in the final sets, will be the first tournament to implement the new rule, which should at least end the confusion that had surrounded the Grand Slamevents, each of which had previously had different rules. Roland Garros starts onMay 22. “Maybe those who want to stick to traditionmight be disappointed, but we wanted to align the four Grand Slams,” Amelie Mauresmo, the new tournament director at Roland Garros, said. “Sometimes a player came to a Grand Slam tournament and didn’t know how the match was going to finish. We also took into account the health of the players, because we realised that over a Grand Slam tournament, when they ended up winning a final set 13-11 or 16-14, it’s really very hard for them in the next round.” The new rule, which will be reviewed after an initial trial period, will also confirm John Isner and Nicolas Mahut’s permanent place in history after their extraordinary Wimbledon encounter in 2010. The match, which finished with Isner winning the deciding set 70-68, lasted 11 hours and 5 minutes. Four years ago Isner lost the second longest match in Wimbledon history, going down 26-24 to Kevin Anderson
in the final set of their semi-final after six hours and 36 minutes. Following that matchWimbledon introduced deciding tie-breaks at 12-12 in final sets, with Novak Djokovic beating Roger Federer in such fashion in their 2019 final, which lasted four hours and 57 minutes. Reaction among players to the rule change has been mixed. Simona Halep, who needed three hours and 44 minutes to beat Lauren Davis 15-13 in the final set at the Australian Open four years ago, welcomed it. “We don’t need matches that last three and a half hours,” she said. “It’s a good rule. I take it.” Taylor Fritz said that he would be happy with the new rule if he found himself in a marathon battle in the future. “I think it’s probably more exciting for the fans to be able to see that match tie-breaker, but I will miss seeing people 20- 20 or 14-14 in the fifth,” he added. “It’s just like an absolute battle, though I think it does suck for those people because you’re so done for your next match if you have one of those.” Rafael Nadal did not have a strong view on the rule change. “I don’t think it’s going to make a big difference,” he said. “I don’t think it will have a big impact at Roland Garros. Inmy opinion the biggest impact is going to be at Wimbledon. Sometimes it’s so difficult to break serve there, so the matches become very long.” After all the restrictions of the last two years, the French federation is planning to welcome full houses at Roland Garros this time. Tickets went on sale early in March and within barely a week 500,000 of the 600,000 had been sold. Court Philippe Chatrier, which is expected to be full for the whole fortnight, will stage 10 night sessions, from the first Monday through to the secondWednesday. However, Gilles Moretton, the president of the French federation stressed: “There’s still a virus circulating, and we have to be cautious. If things were to happen again and the government would take newmeasures, we would not be excluded from those measures.”
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