Cold shower for Denis Shapovalov at Roland-Garros

The matches of Canadians Denis Shapovalov and Félix Auger-Aliassime were once again interrupted by rain on Friday in the third round of the French Open.

A bad start to the duel against the Pole Hubert Herkacz (8th) set the tone for this afternoon to forget at the end of which Shapovalov (118th) found himself with a steep slope to climb back to 3-6, 6-7 ( 0/7) and 1-2 when the organizers threw in the towel to the whims of Mother Nature.

Broken from his first serve, Shapovalov quickly found himself with a 0-3 deficit that he was unable to make up for, notably due to a first service ball below expectations at 58 % in this initial round.

With as many aces (3) as double faults (3), the Ontarian tried as best he could to hang on during the second round, but Herkacz ended up taking advantage of the numerous unforced errors (31) and others errors of his opponent.

We had been playing for an hour when the rain forced the interruption of the game when the score was 4-4. Shapovalov did little to hide his frustration when he left the court grumbling about the officials’ decision to stop play.

When the match resumed after an hour of waiting, Shapovalov countered two break points to maintain the logic of the service and lead 5-4. But it was in the deciding game that Herkacz dealt another hard blow to the hopes of the Torontonian who let two set points slip away at 6-5 and 15-40, giving up 11 consecutive points to his rival.

Shapovalov’s rout continued at the start of the third set, where Herkacz extended his uninterrupted points streak to 17, before the Canadian made an ace to halt his descent into hell.

A third stoppage of the match followed, then a definitive postponement of the rest of the match until Saturday.

Auger-Aliassime in charge

For his part, Quebecer Félix Auger-Aliassime (21st) faces American Ben Shelton (15th) in another third round duel presented on court no. 7.

In what constitutes the first clash between these two players in the professional ranks, Auger-Aliassime led 5-4 and was going to serve for the set when rain fell again on the French capital.

With a victory, Auger-Aliassime would match his best performance at Roland Garros with an appearance in the round of 16, a stage already reached in 2022.

Rublev’s angry disappointment

Earlier, the Russian Andrey Rublev (6th), at the end of his nerves and somewhat ashamed afterwards, missed out on his third round match. He was swept aside 7-6 (8/6), 6-2 and 6-4 by the Italian Matteo Arnaldi (35th), author of a very solid performance in his first participation at Roland-Garros.

A two-time quarter-finalist, the 26-year-old left the Simonne-Mathieu court almost in tears, after seeing red during the match, screaming, hitting his thighs with his racket when it wasn’t slaps on his face.

A worrying attitude to say the least that he regretted at a press conference, between affliction and resignation at not being able to control himself at the height of his frustrations.

I am really disappointed with my behavior. From this point of view, I don’t think I’ve done worse in a grand slam. This is the first time I’ve really had such a bad attitude. The problem is the head. Today I killed myself, period […] I collapsed, everything escaped me.

Arnaldi will face the Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas (No. 9) in the round of 16, winner of the Chinese Zhizhen Zhang (44th) in three sets of 6-3, 6-3 and 6-1.

With information from Agence France-Presse