If Félix Auger-Aliassime lived a waking dream at the Olympic Games, his tennis unfortunately fell asleep for his return to Montreal, Wednesday evening, on the center court of the National Bank Open.
In fact, after playing a phenomenal amount of matches in the last few days on the ochre of Paris, the Quebecer seemed tired, very tired against the Italian Flavio Cobolli. A 22-year-old player, 33rd in the world and still on the rise, who took him out 6-3 and 6-2 in the first round.
“I am disappointed, but I have to be realistic,” said Félix, who seemed, rightly, disappointed but realistic at the press conference.
“The last few days have not been easy to get used to the conditions. What happened happened, but I’m not going to worry too much about this match.”
Photo Martin Chevalier
A very rare sequence
It is true that Auger-Aliassime has just experienced a very rare sequence in the career of a tennis player. In Paris, he played 11 matches in six days.
In fact, the three players who beat him in singles at the Games, Serbian Novak Djokovic, Spaniard Carlos Alcaraz and Italian Lorenzo Musetti, all chose to skip the National Bank Open.
And not all of them had chosen to take part in the men’s doubles and mixed doubles in Paris.
Photo Getty Images via AFP
Felix, for his part, would have actually “asked himself more” about whether he should play this week if the tournament following the Games had not taken place in his hometown. “But at the same time, I am an eternal optimist,” he pointed out.
In addition to these matches, the 23-year-old player only arrived in Montreal on the night of Sunday to Monday. Since then, he has multiplied media meetings, training sessions, tennis clinics and played a doubles match.
These last three points in the hope of successfully making the transition from clay to hard, a surface on which he had not played matches since last March.
Getty Images via AFP
Everyone was asleep
However, this attempt at preparation was in vain: what was his best weapon in Paris (and indeed, quite a bit throughout his career) abandoned him on Wednesday evening.
With only 46% of first serves in play, it is almost impossible to win at this level.
“All other aspects of my game […] also explain what happened, regretted the 19th world number. […] But I had a very bad evening in service.”
And despite the wave of love he received from “his” crowd when he entered the court around 7pm, in front of a full house, “FAA” never managed to come out of his torpor. He brought the crowd with him, despite a few fists raised after his best shots of the match.
Photo Martin Chevalier
Yes, there were cheers of “Go Felix!” and rapid applause when the 14th seed won the first game of the second set, but the party never got going, with everyone seeming to see that there was little hope of the local hero prevailing.
In fact, he never got a chance to get the party going: even Cobolli, a recent finalist in Washington, looked like a guy who couldn’t wait to go to bed.
But the Italian took the opposite route to get there more quickly: he multiplied his attacks, including some spectacular ones with his forehand.
The young racquet had less tennis in her legs, despite having also played several matches (five in as many days) in the last week.
Photo Martin Chevalier
A decision to make
Now Felix will have another decision to make. Will he be at the Cincinnati Masters next week to prepare for the US Open, or will he take a week off to be fresh and ready for the last major tournament of the season?
“I have a week before the Cincinnati tournament starts,” he said. “I’ll probably go there, and as the tournament gets closer, I’ll see how I feel.”
“It’s difficult because you always have to find the right compromise between rest and playing matches in tournament conditions.”
In the meantime, Auger-Aliassime will celebrate his 24th birthday on Thursday. He would probably have preferred to do it on Montreal’s central station in the evening.
But he will forever have a beautiful Olympic bronze medal to console him.
2024-08-08 00:20:54
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