By HOWARD FENDRICH AP Tennis Writer
PARIS — Novak Djokovic experienced the lowest of lows – pulling out of the French Open after tearing the meniscus in his right knee – and the highest of highs – winning a long-sought Olympic gold medal for Serbia – at Roland-Garros last year. This trip to the site went smoothly, once he got going.
Other than some first-set interruptions by, and lengthy discussions about, the windy, wet weather, the 24-time major champion was unbothered during a 6-3, 6-3, 6-3 victory over 98th-ranked Mackie McDonald of the United States at Court Philippe-Chatrier in the first round.
“He makes it seem like a video game, almost, for him,” said McDonald, a 30-year-old Californian who played college tennis at UCLA and twice has been to the fourth round at Grand Slam tournaments. “He’s able to just do so much. I don’t even think he was playing his best tennis or his highest level. But if I pushed him to a different point, he would bring it up.”
One example: When McDonald earned his first break points, getting to love-40 at 3-2 in the second set, Djokovic came up with three big serves, a 120 mph ace, a 123 mph ace and a 122 mph service winner.
Djokovic compiled 32 winners – 18 more than McDonald – and just 20 unforced errors in a match that eventually was played with the lights on and the retractable roof closed.
“I’m a competitor, and losing stings,” McDonald said, “but playing Novak on that court is something I’ll remember.”
Before Djokovic, who just turned 38 and won his 100th career title last weekend, walked onto the playing surface, he was identified by the stadium announcer by his total number of Slam trophies, the three he’s won at the French Open, and the Summer Games gold he won “here in Paris.”
“I still remember last year’s Olympic Games. It was the last time I was here,” Djokovic said afterward. “The emotion is very strong.”
The medal that means so much to him?
“I don’t have the medal with me. But I have a picture of the medal in my bag,” he said. “The medal is with my father. My dad likes trophies more than I do, so I gave him mine.”
Once Coco Gauff found her rackets – a relatively important piece of equipment for a tennis player – all was well for her in the first round. Gauff showed up on court, opened her bag and peered inside to find it was missing her rackets. The start of the warmup was delayed, but then everything went Gauff’s way, and the 2023 U.S. Open champion got past Olivia Gadecki, 6-2, 6-2.
Gauff jokingly blamed her coach for the missing rackets.
“Honestly, as long as I’ve been on tour, my coach has always put the rackets in the bag before the match because he’s very superstitious,” she said. “I’m blaming it on my coach. It’s OK.”
Gadecki also found humor in the incident.
“Now that I think about it, it seems like that was the only way I was going to win the match,” she said about Gauff’s empty-handed arrival. “It was a funny little incident.”
Unseeded American Alycia Parks, ranked 52nd in the world, beat No. 14 seed Karolina Muchova, 6-3, 2-6, 6-1, in the last women’s match of the day. Muchova was the runner-up to Iga Swiatek at Roland-Garros in 2023.
Other winners included the No. 3 seeds, Jessica Pegula and Alexander Zverev, and 18-year-old Mirra Andreeva, but 2021 U.S. Open champion Daniil Medvedev, who was seeded 11th, lost to Cam Norrie, 7-5, 6-3, 4-6, 1-6, 7-5, across nearly four hours.
Other seeded men were sent home when 18-year-old João Fonseca dispatched No. 30 Hubert Hurkacz, 6-2, 6-4, 6-2, and when No. 16 Grigor Dimitrov quit while leading American qualifier Ethan Quinn two sets to one. This is the fourth consecutive major tournament at which Dimitrov retired.
Frenchman Gael Monfils rallied from two sets down and beat Hugo Dellien of Bolivia, 4-6, 3-6, 6-1, 7-6 (4) 6-1, in a match that lasted more than three hours.
Monfils was injured on the fifth point of the match when he fell and crashed into a side billboard. The 38-year-old Monfils was moving to his right as he returned a shot into the net. He scraped his hands trying to break his fall and required a few minutes of medical treatment before play resumed.
Monfils, ranked 42nd in the world and with a history of right knee and leg injuries, was a point away from breaking the 90th-ranked Dellien’s serve and ended up losing the game and going behind 3-0 in the first set.
After dropping the second set, Monfils battled back and, helped by a 19-2 advantage in aces, advanced to the second round.
PICKING HUMANS OVER TECHNOLOGY
For Djokovic, this is a relatively easy call: He, like many players, thinks the French Open is making a mistake by eschewing the electronic line-calling used at most big tennis tournaments and instead remaining old school by letting line judges decide whether serves or other shots land in or out.
Plenty of sports, from soccer and baseball to the NFL, are replacing, or at least helping, officials with some form of high-tech replays or other technology. Tennis, too, is following that trend, except at Roland-Garros, where competition continues through June 8.
Even the longest-running and most tradition-bound of the majors, Wimbledon, is – gasp! – abandoning line judges and moving to an automatic system this year. The WTA and ATP added machine-generated rulings this season for tour events on red clay, the surface at the French Open. But Grand Slam hosts can do what they want, and the French tennis federation is keeping the human element.
Djokovic understands why folks might prefer the way to keep things the way they were for more than a century in his sport. He gets why there could be an inclination to shy away from too much change in a world now drowning in cell phones and streaming and social media.
“You don’t want to give everything away to the technology, right? But if I have to choose between the two, I’m more of a proponent of technology. It’s just more accurate, saves time, and … (means) less people on the court” said Djokovic, 38, who was disqualified from the 2020 U.S. Open for inadvertently hitting an official with a ball hit out of frustration between games.
That edition of the tournament in New York only placed line judges on its two largest courts, while others used an electronic setup, a nod to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Australian Open got rid of all line judges in 2021, a first at a tennis major; the U.S. Open did the same later that year.
The French Open remains a holdout, and that’s not likely to change anytime soon.
“Unless the players are unanimous and come to us and say, ‘We won’t play if there isn’t a machine’ … then I think we’ve got a great future ahead of us to maintain this style of refereeing,” French federation president Gilles Moretton said, while boasting of the quality of his country’s officials.
Players don’t sound that adamant, although they tend to echo the opinion of 2023 U.S. Open champion Gauff, who is 21: “I mean, I don’t know if it’s like the ‘Gen Z’ in me, but I think if we have the technology, we should use it.”
Still, there is some charm to be found in the choreography of players insisting a call was wrong and chair umpires climbing down for a closer look at a ball mark on the clay. Watch a day of TV coverage from Paris and odds are good that dance will take place – probably more than once.
“That’s what makes clay special, in a way – that you can always review the shots. … Obviously, you can’t deny that electronic line-calling is the future, and everything is moving towards AI and artificial intelligence,” said Stefanos Tsitsipas, the runner-up to Djokovic at Roland-Garros four years ago. “But me, personally, I wouldn’t mind playing on clay with maybe the judgment of a human instead of a robot.”
No matter the form of officiating, there invariably are times when athletes – perhaps eyesight or faith strained by heat-of-the-moment tension and an eagerness to be correct – just won’t agree with a call.
That, in turn, can lead to extended arguments and sometimes a scene seen recently: A player grabs a cell phone from the sideline to snap a photo of a mark in a bid to prove, and win, a point.
Aryna Sabalenka, a three-time Slam champ and the top-ranked women’s player, and Alexander Zverev, a three-time major finalist, did just that, although they weren’t the first. Back at the 2013 French Open, Sergiy Stakhovsky put down his racket and took a picture of where a ball had landed during a loss to Richard Gasquet; Stakhovsky said then he’d done it before.
“Linespeople mess up sometimes,” said 2023 Australian Open semifinalist Tommy Paul. “Automatic line-calling is going to mess up probably less.”
JABEUR: PRIORITIZING MEN’S SCHEDULE IS ‘SAD’
Ons Jabeur heavily criticized the decision from French Open organizers to again prioritize men’s matches in the late-evening slot on Court Philippe-Chatrier.
The first four days of the 2025 tournament have seen men’s matches scheduled in the slot, a separately ticketed session that begins at 8:15 p.m. local time.
Since the night session was introduced in 2022, just two of its 33 matches have been women’s singles. On the flip side, the first match on Court Philippe-Chatrier is usually played in front of sparse crowds, and all four openers this year have been women’s singles.
Jabeur, who last year said players deserve “better scheduling” after several matches went on beyond midnight, spoke after her first-round loss to Magdalena Frech on Tuesday, criticizing the decision to solely pick men’s matches for the night session.
“It’s still sad that we are still seeing this,” Jabeur said. “I keep standing by my words.
“In Europe, in general, it’s unfortunate for women’s sports in general. Not for tennis but for in general. I hope whoever is making the decision, I don’t think they have daughters because I don’t think they want to treat their daughters like this.
“You know, it’s a bit ironic. They don’t show women’s sport, they don’t show women’s tennis, and then they ask the question, ‘Yeah, but mostly they watch men.’ Of course they watch men more because you show men more. Everything goes together.
“It’s a shame from the federation, a shame from the Prime, whatever called the TV, that they made such a contract like this. A lot of great players, they deserve to be there. One of the matches was Naomi [Osaka] and Paula [Badosa]. Such an unbelievable match. They were supposed to be there. Like last year, Iga [Swiatek] and Naomi was supposed to be there. A lot of great matches, they should have been there.”
Jabeur’s criticism comes a day after Moretton suggested the decision on night matches was geared toward fans.
“The schedule is one key point on the tournament,” Moretton said. “Sometimes we have to think about what could be better for spectators. That’s why sometimes we have to make some choices.”
Jabeur said to that: “I’m not sure what kind of fans he’s talking about. I know I’m a fan. I will watch that match.”
WHO IS PLAYING WEDNESDAY?
The second round begins on Day 4, with a schedule that includes defending champions Iga Swiatek and Carlos Alcaraz, 2024 runner-up Jasmine Paolini and two-time finalist Casper Ruud. Swiatek meets 2021 U.S. Open champion Emma Raducanu in the day session’s last match in the main stadium.
AP Sports Writer Andrew Dampf contributed to this story.
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