French Open 2022: quick shift change
Today the last evening shift takes place at the French Open 2022 - from 8:45 p.m. Casper Ruud and Holger Rune will play for the last free place in the semi-finals. A summary.
by Jens Huiber
last edit:
May 31, 2022, 08:22 pm
A night session is still pending at the French Open 2022, Casper Ruud and Holger Rune will end the evening competitions this Wednesday. It started promisingly with Stefan Tsitsipas ' five-set win against Lorenzo Musetti . Then you had to look for the pearls with a magnifying glass. The matches of Carlos Alcaraz against Sebastian Korda or Karen Khachanov went too smoothly, the classic on Tuesday evening between Novak Djokovic and Rafael Nadal at least brought a certain legend flair to the Philippe-Chatrier court.
At least: The organizers did everything right with the scheduling of the day games, despite the later start at 12 o'clock (the other matches started an hour earlier in the early rounds). Only once did the revelers have to wait a few minutes: after the encounter between Rafael Nadal and Félix Auger-Aliassime .
The Night Sessions will remain
But lo and behold: The creative disorder that is created in the Stade Roland Garros when the fans switch between day and evening - it works. It took a maximum of 20 minutes for the grandstands to empty completely and fill up a few percent again. Because that's also true, of course: no consideration was given to latecomers here, after all we're not in the final of the Champions League. For comparison: At the US Open, you should always plan at least three quarters of an hour between the two shifts.
Which of course nobody can do anything about: That early summer didn't want to break out at the 2022 edition of the French Open. Neither the players (Rafael Nadal!) nor the fans were happy, the latter were able to brave the cold with proper clothing and blankets.
Gilles Simon sets the highlight
There is no question that the night shifts will also be an integral part of the second major of the year in the future: on the one hand, because the TV and streaming rights to the evening games in France were sold individually. And of course the French Tennis Federation is happy to take the additional income from 15,000 fans with it. Because the ranks were almost always full.
In terms of drama, however, it wasn't the Court Philippe-Chatrier that delivered the big highlight: that happened on the first Monday at the Simonne-Mathieu. There Gilles Simon thrilled the fans with his five-set win against Pablo Carreno Busta until one o'clock in the morning.
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