It was getting darker and darker on the site south of the Bois de Boulogne, the park in the 16th arrondissement. On those courts where tennis was no longer played, the masts were lowered and the spotlights fixed there were switched off. Cold crowded out the warmth that had provided summer comfort during the day. It was midnight and it was like the French Open getting ready for bed. Bonne nuit!
But wait a minute: the lights were still on on Court 8. At Court Philippe-Chatrier too.
It wasn’t quiet either. It wouldn’t be surprising if people in the Parisian suburbs pulled earplugs out of their nightstands at the noise that flooded Roland Garros late Tuesday night. “Yaaaaanick Hanfmann, you’re the best Maaaaann!” It rang out from the small square 8, which is inconspicuously located in front of the mighty stadium called Court Suzanne-Lenglen. A group of German fans made Rabatz like Ballermann, one wore a DFB jersey with “Klose” on the back. It is well known that Hanfmann is hard of hearing, he uses a hearing aid, just not on the pitch. With the noise on this Paris night, that wouldn’t have been bearable either. “That would have been too much too,” he said later with a smile. “System overload.”
At a distance of 200 meters it sounded: “Gaëëëël, Gaëëëël!” A trumpeter trumpeted, people stood, jubilation, applause, desperation, joy, every minute emotions met here and there. Down on the Terre battue, nowhere does the red sand sound as beautiful as in France. And upstairs, in the stands, where the spectators cheered.
A fall throws Hanfmann out of rhythm – and Monfils has to fend off a breakball in the fifth set
This May 30th will not be big in tennis annals, first round matches are first round matches. And ticked off! In a week and a half it’s about the titles and all the fame. But for two players, the German Hanfmann, 31, and the French Monfils, 36, their performances in those hours meant the world. Anyone who thinks that’s too pathetic just had to look into the eyes of the two when they spoke at the press conferences.
Hanfmann defeated the Brazilian Thiago Monteiro 6: 3, 7: 5, 6: 7 (6), 6: 7 (2), 6: 4 in 4:56 hours. Monfils won 3-6, 6-3, 7-5, 1-6, 7-5 against Argentinian Sebastián Báez. Hanfmann served at 5: 4 in the third set to win, fell, rolled into the net, twisted his knee, but everything was fine. He had match point in the tiebreaker of the third set, didn’t use it. In the fifth set he was 1:4 behind. He said to himself, “In a match like this, it’s never over until the last point is taken.”
Stuck for a while after a fall: Yannick Hanfmann worked his way into the second lap just before midnight.
(Photo: Jürgen Hasenkopf/Imago)
Hanfmann’s greed that night was understandable. He finally wanted to prove that he can also fight. Inwardly, these days are a chaos of emotions for him anyway. Ranked 65th in the world, he’s actually high enough not to qualify, but his quarterfinals in Rome, where he beat top ten guys Taylor Fritz and Andrei Rublev en route, came after the Roland Garros entry deadline instead of. In the Paris qualifiers, he lost the third (usually decisive) match. He was out, but had hope. Three lucky losers were drawn from five applicants. Hanfmann: was not drawn. But then he suddenly moved up, someone pulled back at the last moment. Hanfmann admitted: “My last days, my last weeks were all haywire.”
What should Monfils say? A man who is really to the French what his name says, a son; who collected trophies at will as a junior, but as an adult he was never able to win a Grand Slam tournament because someone regularly got in his way – in case of doubt himself. He would have loved to replace Yannick Noah as the last French winner, the 1983 triumphed here.
Made for the limelight: Gaël Monfils suffered from cramps but that didn’t stop him this time in Paris.
(Photo: Julian Finney/Getty)
Monfils is now 36 years old, married to fellow professional Elina Svitolina, who as a Ukrainian suffers so much from the war and stands up for her country, so Monfils fought a different fight. From now on, every game could be his last in Paris, even if he wants to play here again in 2024, actually, the Olympics in this grandiose city would be the best of all stages for his farewell. But Monfils is also permanently injured. He may have Spider-Man athletics, but he’s not robust after all his turns on the pitch.
His drive in the first round wasn’t to win a battle. His motivation was daughter Skaï. “When I was 0: 3 behind” – he spoke of the fifth set, in which it was even 0: 4 and almost 0: 5 when he was struggling with cramps to the end – “I thought: I’ve never had a Match won as a father. My daughter is here. Me had to win. I tried to harness the energy of the audience. I have no words.” In the end, the fans had sung the Marseillaise for him.
Nowhere does this wedging of each other succeed as enchantingly as on sand
When both Hanfmann and Monfils came to the press, May 31 had long since dawned. As loud as it had been in the squares, it was now so quiet. Many international reporters were long gone. So it happened that Hanfmann only spoke this beautiful sentence to a few German reporters: “That’s just a Grand Slam, right? Five sentences – there are two people who give it to each other.” There is no better way to describe what is unique about this tournament category.
This works particularly well on clay in Paris, this wedging, the bullying of each other, the rallies last longer than on hard court, much longer than on grass. To kill a ball, to hit a winner, often enough you have to throw the ball over the net ten, fifteen times and run like you’re trying to escape. Hanfmann and Thiago Monteiro did all that, as did Monfils and Báez.
The victories would have been something special for Monteiro and Baez, of course, but it was Hanfmann’s turn, he was allowed to see it. At the last Australian Open he played a similarly close duel against the Australian Rinky Hijikata, but lost after a 2-0 set lead. Two German boys who had watched with their mother in Melbourne in January were actually there again on Tuesday as claqueurs, Hanfmann thought it was great: “In Australia everyone cried bitterly. And then today a few tears of joy. That was really cool. ” At the latest when Monteiro missed two light smashes in the fifth set, he suspected: “Maybe God was on my side for a moment.”
Clearly, it was about something higher that night. Just as Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha sought his happiness in the most diverse ways of life, so do the tennis players on the court, again and again – some find the long-awaited answers to the big questions and doubts of their professional existence in just one game. Hanfmann did the preparation in Argentina for the first time, his trainer Juan Pablo Brzezicki comes from Buenos Aires. Now he could feel confirmed for this courageous step, with which he broke his routine. That he failed in similar matches before? “I had to go through all of this before realizing: Hey, I’m a really fit guy. I can go to matches like that.” He smiled.
Monfils found only one other match had been as emotional for him: the one he played in Paris in the third round in 2015 against Uruguayan Pablo Cuevas. He won’t be able to do anything comparable this time. He was supposed to play the cheeky Dane Holger Rune in round two – but on Wednesday evening, just before midnight, Monfils called in sick; his body went on strike. Hanfmann, on the other hand, meets the Argentinian Francisco Cerundolo, another Duracell type. The man from Karlsruhe said: “I think I’m riding a small wave. I hope I can ride it as far as possible.” Then he wished the rest good night.