Paris (AFP)
Gaël Monfils, world No. 9, was eliminated in the first round of Roland-Garros, a first in his career since 2005, beaten by Kazakh Alexander Bublik (49th) in four sets 6-4, 7-5, 3- 6, 6-3, Monday in Paris.
The 34-year-old Frenchman, semi-finalist at Roland-Garros in 2008, remained on two defeats at the start of Rome and then Hamburg in September, his resumption tournaments after six months without competition due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
He had chosen to give up the American mini-tour on the hard Cincinnati-US Open concentrated in New York.
Monfils climbed to the round of 16 at Roland Garros in 2019 and then played a quarter-final at the US Open.
He had started 2020 perfectly with two titles in Montpellier and Rotterdam, plus a round of 16 at the Australian Open and a semi-final in Dubai.
Performance that allowed him to climb to 9th place in the ATP ranking, making him the best placed French player.
But the beautiful dynamic has seized up with the Covid-19 health crisis and the long months of forced break.
On the Suzanne-Lenglen court on Monday, he appeared totally lost for two and a half sets against Bublik, multiplying unforced errors (58), double faults (12) and exchanges with the chair umpire at side changes.
His reaction of pride in the third set and at the start of the fourth was not enough to reverse the trend against the power of the Kazakh serve (nearly 200 km / h on average in first ball).
In addition to his semi-final in 2008, Monfils has three quarter-finals in 2009, 2011 and 2014. He missed the Parisian Grand Slam in 2012 and 2016.
© 2020 AFP