For Roland Garros, Prime Video, which broadcasts 10 night sessions and all the semi-finals, has enlisted the services of the former tournament director, Guy Forget. The man who was also Davis Cup Captain will therefore comment on the farewells of two players he had under his command: Jo Wilfrid Tsonga and Gilles Simon. And tells us about the end of this golden generation, anyway…
Paris Match. When you were boss of the Roland Garros tournament, you worked hard to save it by modernizing it, with a roof in particular. Are you going to attend this “normal” post-pandemic edition, in a fully renovated stadium with a twinge in your heart, since you have not been its director for a year and a half?
Guy Forget. Nope ! I love this tournament too much, since my youngest years, to cultivate any bitterness. The tournament is in a good place on the map of major competitions. It attracts players, the public and partners. It means we did a good job. Above all, I will live it in a more relaxed way. It’s been a long time since I’ve followed the matches from start to finish.
Recently, some players have complained of finishing their scheduled night session match at no time and having to play again early the next day, without a real night’s sleep. As in other sports, isn’t tennis being eaten away by the imperatives of broadcasters who are given more and more power? Which is inevitable since they are asked for more and more money?
Tennis competes with other sports and events of all kinds. The public must make budgetary choices. Our sport must therefore innovate to remain attractive. But you need to be careful. The principle of the night session is a good initiative, making it possible to satisfy all those, and there were many of them, who could not come during the day. Or simply, find places. The center does not have the capacity of the Stade de France. We must therefore find ways to adapt the proposed show.
To the point of changing the rules, and removing the tie break in the 5th set for example, often the scene of incredible shows precisely…?
I was not necessarily for it. Insofar as in the history of Roland Garros, there have rarely been matches that dragged on in the 5th set in an insane way. As was the case at Wimbledon for example (Editor’s note Mahut-Isner. 70-68 in the 5th. More than 11 hours of play!). But that’s down to the speed of the surface, where you can hold your serve longer. On clay, this is less the case. Where a player ends up paying for his fatigue, gets broken and the match ends in a reasonable time. I’m not sure that Roland Garros won by standardizing the 5th set with the 3 other Grand Slam tournaments.
What in-game changes are you in favor of?
To the “No let” rule, for example. If the ball grazes the net when serving but is in the service box, we play. It is tested in juniors and in American colleges. It didn’t destabilize anyone and it axes this sequence of play less. I’m not against shortening the sets either. And finally, the duration of the matches. A tennis match can be very long and boring! And short, but thrilling. Anyway, I think that in the short to medium term, it will be the broadcasters who will impose it. They will assign a broadcast space-time, and it will be up to the tennis matches to fit into this duration.
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Even Nadal has a better hand than Richard
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This edition will see the farewells of Tsonga and Simon. Gasquet continues but more for his pleasure. Rest Monfils…Honestly, you who have been captain of the Davis Cup, can’t you say that it is not “normal” that none of the 4 won at least one grand slam and, if we add the balance sheet in Master 1000, only… 2 titles! These 4 very talented players, in 10-12 years of career?
If there are errors made, they are not to be attributed to the federation. But to players. Can’t blame the coaches, the bad luck, the injury, no! The only person responsible, in victory as in defeat, is the player. Jim Courrier, (Editor’s note American player, former world number one) said: “I don’t have the talent of a Sampras but I have that of hurting myself. In training, in the dose of work, I go beyond the others. I was exhausted but I wanted to do even more. And it is true that it is a talent that! Envy doesn’t work. Kobe Bryant said he trained 2-3 hours more every day than his teammates. Multiplied by 365 days, it ends up making a difference, of course!
Guy Forget.
© DR
You say things like that about French players…
The Big Four, Federer, Nadal, Djokovic and Murray say, were stronger than them. We praise the technique of Gasquet for example but Federer is much stronger technically. Even Nadal has a better hand than Richard. Djokovic does what he wants with his wrist. Murray has a crazy touch too. I imply that we should not criticize the French players for not having won grand slams because they did not do enough. I’m just saying that if they couldn’t go higher, do more, that just means they weren’t strong enough to win those tournaments. That’s all. A player who is short is penalized. A player who does not manage to put in place a logic of surpassing oneself, I would say, is also penalized. They worked on the French players, including their mental strength, but they did not reach the level of the others. That’s all.
How do you explain that great tennis nations, like Sweden or even the United States, no longer have top players? When other countries, with less resources, bring out a Djokovic or a Tsitsipas. By caricaturing, the program of the federations is not ultimately useless. And if a genie should hatch, it will come from anywhere?
In team sport, good work by the federations is more profitable, I believe. The number of players trained, the place he can find within a team with his particular qualities, facilitate the emergence of talents. In individual sport, it is more complicated. To win in tennis, you have to know how to master everything and be the best in all the key areas of the game. In football, for example, a very great defender can very well become a world number in his position, without knowing how to score goals. And vice versa. In tennis, to win the biggest tournaments, you have to know how to be the best defender, the best attacker and the best goalkeeper. People are sometimes choosy about Gael Monfils or Richard Gasquet but they were 6th and 7th in the world! With this level in football, they would be stars in Barcelona, Bayern Munich or Real. Where they would have been jailers for 15 years! And won several champion’s league. In tennis, you are alone. Neymar plays at PSG with Mbappe, Messi, Veratti etc… Gael, he doesn’t play with Federer on his left and Nadal behind him in defence.
So, you have to relax and rely on fate then…?
Don’t overdo it. A federation is necessary to take out players, to influence certain aspects of training, depending on the evolution of the game, but I would say that it can lead a player to become world junior champion. What I was. But when I had to face beefy 30-year-old players at 18, I realized that now I was alone with my destiny in my hands. Everyone was available to help me, and they helped me, but it ultimately went through me. And nobody else. It took me a while to go through the steps. I didn’t have the maturity of a Nadal or a Djoko at the same age. It came late, too late. Otherwise, I would have had a much better career.
To read : France Télévisions, Amazon Prime… where and when to watch Roland-Garros?
How do you explain such a gap between a player of your generation, charred at 30-32, and what we see today, players aged 35-37, staying at the highest level. Have dietetics and recovery changed so much in 30 years?
In my time, I was told that you had to eat a lot of meat because it was good to be strong. I ate steaks at 9 a.m. to play at 10:30 a.m.! Today, Djoko weighs every gram of soy he eats, a player like Wawrinka had knee surgery using a technique that didn’t exist in my time. All the best have physical trainers and follow very advanced stretching and even sleep protocols. Yes, the difference with our generation is real and it shows, indeed. Ah, I forgot the best: Murray plays with a hip prosthesis. And he won an ATP tournament! It was completely unthinkable that, in my time.