The moment Jannik Sinner left the court at Roland Garros on Thursday, as succumbed to an unseasonable European heat wave as Juan Manuel Cerundro, the French Open became a tournament determined solely by who plays the best tennis.
The next week and a half in Paris will be largely about the mind.
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If Sinner or the injured Carlos Alcaraz don’t take part in the draw, one of two things will happen.
The 39-year-old Novak Djokovic has been largely a part-time player on the ATP Tour these days, struggling physically in best-of-five sets, but his 25th Grand Slam victory will prove conclusively that the men’s second-tier favorites are weaker than ever.
Or conversely, someone who has never won a major title will step up and take advantage of a once-in-a-career opportunity.
So who will it be?
alexander zverevperhaps the greatest player in men’s tennis history without a slam, ended up becoming a basket case every time he approached a major prize. The pressure on him now will be unlike anything he has ever experienced before.
Casper Rudetennis’ quintessential nice guy and two-time French Open finalist, may finally be hitting the big time. But can you really trust someone who has never shown a killer instinct to seize this moment?
Are there any such people among the 19-year-old players to watch? Joan Fonseca or Rafael Jodal Are you really ready for something this big?
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An interesting situation is unfolding at Roland Garros after more than two decades in which a small number of players have dominated most of the major tournaments.
But it’s also a situation in which the current candidates could become the laughing stock of generations to come.
If the 39-year-old Djokovic were to win the tournament for the fourth time, it would rightly be celebrated as a monumental feat. Whatever Djokovic’s legend may be, winning the title at this tournament, at nearly 40 years old, would further enhance his claim as the greatest player of all time.
Novak Djokovic uses ice to cool down during the men’s singles match against Valentin Royer on the fourth day of the French Open.
(NurPhoto, Getty Images)
On the other hand, what would happen to a group of players in their 20s who don’t have the names Alcaraz or Sinner, if they let a physically declining old man who barely plays on tour take away their best chance to win the majors?
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That would be an unacceptable boundary. An indictment of a generation of mentally soft tennis players who are unable to realize it when it matters most. It’s shameful.
With all due respect to Djokovic, he deserves a ton of praise, but this shouldn’t happen.
Look, this guy is still a great athlete, even after winning a gold medal at the 2024 Olympics and accomplishing every goal he’s ever set in tennis, he still competes and still wants it just as much.
If you don’t have clear goals to motivate you, it’s not easy to train with discipline, stay in great shape, and keep striving to find ways to improve and adjust your game. An aging body only makes it more difficult – and Djokovic has appeared on court so often lately that he appears to be on the verge of physical collapse.
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There’s absolutely no reason he’s still doing this other than this reality. Outside of Sinner and Alcaraz, he smells weakness. There’s a good reason for that.
Let’s go back to the 2020 US Open. It was the last time a men’s major tournament was held this widely. As you may remember, Roger Federer was injured. Rafael Nadal has decided not to travel due to concerns about the coronavirus and preparations for the French Open, which has been postponed to the fall. Djokovic was also present, but in a fit of anger, he hit the ball and hit the linesman in the throat, resulting in a forfeit.
Suddenly, someone who wasn’t supposed to win was winning a slam tournament. And the resulting tennis was… well, let’s just say it reflected the enormity of this moment for just about everyone. That final produced some of the most nerve-wracking, high-pressure, tentative tennis ever seen on such a big stage, with Dominic Thiem defeating Zverev, who had led an early two-set lead, in a fifth-set tie-break.
It wasn’t very clean.
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But it was also perhaps more of a lesson for Djokovic than anything else. Although he acknowledged that he was unlikely to survive a No. 5 match at the 2025 U.S. Open with both Alcaraz and Sinner in the same tournament, he knew that one injury or bad day would be enough for this kind of opportunity to present itself.
Roland Garros is coming. You would think that everyone left in the draw would have a chance to win. That may be more of a curse than a blessing for most of them.
If all of these young candidates don’t have what it takes to step up in this tournament, or to overcome the heartbreak in the final business tournament, Djokovic will be happy to pick up the pieces.
And the funny thing is that these days Djokovic often looks like a different person when he’s playing, except when he’s under pressure. Since his surprise Australian Open final, Djokovic has played in two tournaments, going 2-2 with losses to Jack Draper and Dino Prijmic.
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It took Djokovic nearly four grueling hours to defeat world No. 74 Valentin Royer in Wednesday’s second round.
But for others in the field, beating him at a Slam these past few years has been as much a mental challenge as a physical one. And who do you think has the best brains in tennis history? Even at the age of 39, it hasn’t gone away.
History tells us that if this becomes a test of who will be brave enough to take on the biggest opportunity of their career, they will all fall apart and Djokovic will go home with another big trophy.
If the Zverevs and Ruuds of the world allowed that to happen when they were in their physical prime, it stands to reason that they would be ridiculed and removed from the slams for the rest of their careers.
