French Open 2023 – Paris
View(s):Europe, Scandinavia, America, Africa
Eight women emerged to play in the French Open 2023 quarter-finals. Five of them are from Europe. They are Muchova, Paulyuchenkova, Swiatek, Svitolina and Sabalenka. Gauff is from USA, Jebeur is a Tunisian and Haddad Maia is a Brazilian.
Muchova is on a comeback spell from a land that has given so many good players, Czech Republic. Martina Navratilova and Ivan Lendl were Czech. This Eastern Europe got its push into tennis with Yaroslavl Drobny from 1950s. To accommodate political climate of his time, he lived as Australian, South African, Egyptian and Yugoslavian. A story by itself.
Clay tennis
Surface change means change of mindset in stroke making, shot selection, tactics and physical attributes. On Paris clay this year Djokovic, the lonely survivor of the famous trio, is with young Spaniard Alcaraz on his heels. Possession of their playing abilities makes them formidable exponents. They will have to live in a love hate relationship of the sporting world. Interesting!
The 2023 French Open had too many four-hour nail-biting encounters with rallies of 30 plus shot. Tactically many players used asphalt clay hard court approaches. They rallied with midcourt shots and with tremendous pace and delivered winners to the sides. In some rallies, players played only their forehand, covering the entire breadth of the tennis court plus the wide backhand shots with forehand. An athletic challenge, amazingly, it did happen. Testament of tennis is changing. From afternoon serenades to Blitz-Krieg even on sand courts.
Long matches; order of the day
Djokovic did not drop a set until he played Karen Khachanov. After winning the second set Djokovic took a toilet break and Khachanov was nursing many his blisters on his right hand. Camera picked up the damage. He was done for the 2023 French Open. There was no way he could play his best with so many blisters on his right hand. Djokovic too had to play gruelling long matches to reach the quarter-final. One against Spaniard Fokkina went well over four hours playing just three sets. Djokovic never lost a set until he played Khachanov.
Elina Rybakina sick
Rybakina developed a fever and withdrew from French Open 2023. It sent shock wave, as she was be the opponent for the title match against world’s No.1 Swiatek of Poland. Players exposed to travel elements and changes have to deal with stress. For the event organisers loss of a good player create difficult situations in filling the massive state-of-the-art stadium courts.
So far, global tennis in 2023 got a free flow to conduct events, compared to the last four years. Recession is on us; extent of its impact on tennis world is mostly on player’s purse. Many of the quarter-final matches did not have noticeable attendance. The income of 2023 will have to provide enough to sustain the Roland Garros venue for a full year. WTA and ATP are doing their best to accommodate income crunch of players. Tennis events gives travel and tourism industry much needed business, even in current lean period.
Player development
Regardless of the sport, player development has become the mainstream activity of many sports in the world. Even in our little Sri Lanka athletics, tennis, basketball, badminton, cricket, football have private development academies. Most of the secondary schools depend on them to promote extracurricular activities. Many of the players in French Open of 2023 are children who started their playing carrier in after school academies. Most of the National Associations around the world are not managerially equipped to sustain development programmes and events to sustain development.
In this sense, playing fields have become the prime need of development. Most of the sports clubs properties with playing facilities in metropolises including ours in city of Colombo, find their return of investment via player development programmes. A new economic development segment with population growth and with their demands. Events such as French Open in Paris and other attractive global events promote player development facilitation indirectly.
Tennis Man
Any would-be player, parents, coaches and associations must know to take triumph and defeat in the same vein. Sport never was and never will be about only winning. Challenges makes players stronger. Show me a man who never lost a tennis match and I will show a man who never played tennis.
–George Paldano, European and Asian competition player; Coach German Tennis Federation; National coach Brunei and Sri Lanka; Davis Cup, Federation Cup coach, coached ATP, WTA and ITF ranked players in Europe and Asia; WhatsApp +94775448880–