The unusually fast turnaround between the United States Open and the French is causing problems for players who made deep runs in New York.
Grand Slam tennis does not generally do quick turnarounds. In a normal year, the shortest time between two major tournaments, the French Open final and the start of Wimbledon’s main draw, is 22 days. That break also does not involve intercontinental travel or a shift from a surface that beats up the legs to one that can produce endless slugfests and get muddy. Then came 2020. Not a normal year. In March, as the coronavirus pandemic tore through western Europe, organizers of the French Open moved the start of the tournament from late May to late September, with the main draw starting just 14 days after the men’s final of the United States Open. The effects of that accelerated turnaround became clear just four days into this tournament, perhaps foreshadowing the struggles for players considered serious contenders for deep runs over the next 10 days. On Wednesday, Serena Williams, a U.S. Open semifinalist, dropped out, and Victoria Azarenka, a U.S. Open finalist who won a warm-up tournament in New York, lost in straight sets in the second round at Roland Garros. That meant all four women who made the semifinals at the U.S. Open will be conspicuously absent for the rest of the French Open. One of them, Naomi Osaka, the U.S. Open champion, never made it to the starting line. She pulled out of the tournament to rehabilitate a strained hamstring. Jennifer Brady, the No.21 seed, lost in the first round to Clara Tauson a 17-year-old playing in her first Grand Slam singles match. Williams, who got through her opening-round match Monday with little trouble but spent the last two days hobbling around her hotel, decided even if she had managed another win, the nagging Achilles’ tendon injury that had occurred in New York and did not have time to heal would prevent her from playing deep into the tournament. “I’m struggling to walk, so that’s kind of a telltale sign that I should try to recover,” she said after defaulting against Tsvetana Pironkova of Bulgaria.
