Gauthier Delomez / Photo credits: Ibrahim Ezzat / NurPhoto / NurPhoto via AFP 14:32 p.m., June 02, 2023

While the organizers of Roland-Garros celebrate the 40th anniversary of the victory of Yannick Noah, to date the last Frenchman to have won a Grand Slam in the men's category, questions persist about French tennis. This year again, no French has gone beyond the second round. Europe 1 consultant Cédric Pioline gives his analysis.

The 2023 edition of Roland-Garros unfortunately resembles the previous ones on the French side: in the singles tables, no French representative, whether in the men's or women's category, has managed to reach the third round of the France International. The last French rider, Arthur Rinderknech, did not resist the American Taylor Fritz, seeded 9 and potential outsider.

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A new counter-performance for French tennis, as the organizers celebrate the 40th anniversary of the victory of Yannick Noah, to date the last Frenchman to have won a Grand Slam in the men's category.

French players "came closer" to the title

How to explain this poor record at Roland-Garros for so long? For Cédric Pioline, former world number 5 and consultant of Europe 1, official radio of the tournament, it is above all "a very deep question" to which it is difficult to provide a single answer. "There have been different players over the last 40 years who have come close. There was a finalist, Henri Leconte (in 1984), a number of semi-finalists including me (in 1998)," recalls the man who reached the Grand Slam final twice, at the US Open in 1993 and Wimbledon in 1997.

Cédric Pioline attests: winning a Major, and especially Roland-Garros, "is something very, very difficult. The club (of winners) is very small, so there is no rational explanation, nor miracle solution," he told Europe 1. According to the former champion, winning a Grand Slam results from "a construction on the medium to long term, to get to have this level for one day, to be able to claim to lift a cup and in particular the Coupe des Mousquetaires", the name of the trophy awarded to the winner of the men's singles porte d'Auteuil.

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"There is no miracle recipe"

Is the training of young players by the French Tennis Federation responsible for this failure? Not really, answers Cédric Pioline. "The federation is doing a great background work with infrastructure to try to train. It is true that we are in the trough of the wave, with a generation that has stopped for part (Tsonga, Simon) and is playing its last seasons (Monfils, Gasquet). There is a little hollow, so it feels weird in France, "says the current director of the tournament of Paris-Bercy, recalling that we were used to having at least one representative in the top 10 in the world. Ugo Humbert, the first French player, is currently classified... 40th in the ATP.

"It takes time" to train future champions, insists Cédric Pioline. "Go find out which player has the little extra trick that makes him have the ability to win a Grand Slam. There is no miracle recipe," says the two-time finalist in Majors, who evokes the example of Switzerland: "We can say that Roger Federer comes from a small country, and he is among the three players who have the most impressive record of all time in the history of the game. It's necessarily only related to that (training)." The only certainty for Cédric Pioline, "you have to work a lot, you have to be hungry a lot, and maybe have a little success". It remains to be seen if the new generation will have this "little extra thing" and the "success" that Yannick Noah had in 1983.