Central Europeans Star on Paris Clay
We should get a time violation on this, but The American Spectator’s French Open coverage, such as it has been from afar, would be remiss if it didn’t take note of Barbora Krejčíková’s astonishing achievement in taking both the singles and doubles trophies, the latter with her Czech compatriot Kateřina Siniaková. Miss Krejčíková, who is 25, has been one of the top doubles players for several years, but, as she modestly explained, she longed for the chance to measure herself against the best singlesarians.
The big-hearted team of Nicolas Mahut and Philippe-Hugues Herbert made sure the Marseillaise would be heard at least once on the grand old center court of Roland-Garros Stadium, as they overcame a match point in the men’s doubles final. In mixed, Desirae Krawczyk and Joe Salisbury, from Palm Desert and London respectively, scored one for the Anglosphere.
The big deal, as usual — is this fair? regardless, it is the market — was the men’s singles final, wherein the old beat the young, which in itself is not surprising, given that the old in this case were represented Novak Djokovic, world No. 1, now a serious contender for a calendar-year Grand Slam. Don Budge and Rod Laver, Anglospherians, are the only men to have achieved this feat, to equal which Serbia’s most famous athlete needs to with Slam titles in London and New York this summer.
What made the event dramatic was that the young, represented by 22-year-old Stefanos Tsitsipas, almost pulled off an upset. He led two sets to zero and then lost his sense of mission. The way he put it was that he had no idea what happened, but he felt as if he were facing a different man when the third set began. True, Djokovic played with more control than he showed in the first two sets, but it was impossible to watch the last three sets and not see in Tsitsipas’s game a drop in speed and focus. Physical exhaustion? (“Do I have the sinew left?”) Mental astonishment (“Am I really doing this against the best man in the sport?”) is the mystery of it all.
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