58 Monday May 23 2022 | the times
SportFrench Open
5
Without a full-time mentor as she
prepares to make her French Open
debut, Emma Raducanu has found
some alternative inspiration.
Renowned for gleaming nuggets of
information from a variety of sources,
the books on her reading list have been
purposely chosen to improve her
understanding of other areas of life.
Mindset: The New Psychology of
Success, Billion Dollar Whale and The
Psychology of Money are all being
combed by Raducanu, at present, in
between training sessions. It is an
admirable selection of titles for a
19-year-old who was still sitting her
A-levels this time last year.
“I like reading non-fiction books
because I love to learn,” Raducanu said.
“I always want to hear new things. I feel
like I can always keep growing. I don’t
Junior champion looks to take scalp of ‘role model’ Raducanu
Stuart Fraser get that much downtime but when I do,
I really want to make the most out of
that. You can learn quite a bit from
books and it’s something that I’ve only
started doing more recently.
“I’m very early in my deve-
lopment in all aspects.
There is obviously my
tennis, which I’m 100 per
cent committed to, but
there’s a whole world
outside of tennis that I
definitely want to know,
have more knowledge
about and a better under-
standing [of]. I’m just cul-
turing myself a little bit better.”
Raducanu is still inexperienced
on the wider tour, aside from her US
Open triumph last September, but
already she is something of an idol for
the opponent she encounters today.
Linda Noskova, a 17-year-old from the
Czech Republic, came
through qualifying here to
secure her first professional
grand-slam appearance, 12
months after winning
the junior title at
Roland Garros.
“She’s definite-
ly a role model,”
Noskova said.
“The things she
did at the US
Open were
just incredible.
“I definitely look up
to her, but [she is] my
opponent, and I’m
going to treat her with respect
but also without respect. It would
mean the world to me [to beatRaducanu]. Just playing against a
grand-slam champion is such a
privilege for me.”
Raducanu leads the contingent of all
five British singles players in action on
what is being referred to as
“Manic Monday”. Her fellow
British No 1, Cameron Norrie,
opens his campaign less than
48 hours after winning his
first ATP clay-court trophy at
the Lyon Open on Saturday.
Norrie, 26, referred to it as
the best of his four tour titles
after a three-set win over Alex
Molcan, of Slovakia, in the final.
It was an intriguing statement,
considering the tourna-
ment in Lyon is rated
as an ATP 250, two
tiers down from the
ATP Masters 1,000
event in Indian Wells he won lastyear. “I wanted to get the first one on
the clay,” said Norrie, who was pre-
viously deprived of crucial practice on
the clay when he suffered an early exit
at the Italian Open. “Every match was a
battle just to get over the line. It felt
really good to win it.”
Norrie, who plays the French wild
card Manuel Guinard, is bidding to
reach the fourth round of a grand-slam
event for the first time, having lost in
the third round on four occasions.
He has extra support in his camp
here, with his Scottish father, David,
and Welsh mother, Helen, travelling
from their home in New Zealand for the
first time since March 2020, owing to
the pandemic.
“It is nice just to hang out with them,”
Norrie said. “My dad’s the biggest
tennis fan ever, so he loves watching all
the matches and watching the other
Brits as well.”French
Open
Raducanu v Noskova
Women’s singles,
first round
Approx 2pm
TV: EurosportRaducanu is preparing to make
her debut at the French OpenAlcaraz turns on
the power to evoke
Nadal’s Paris debut
defending champion of course, more so
to believe I can do it again. Reliving the
memories from last year is something
that obviously gives me goose bumps
and motivation to try to replicate that.”
There was once a time when Domin-
ic Thiem would also have been consid-
ered a tough obstacle in the same half of
the draw but this is certainly not the
case at present. The two-times French
Open runner-up from Austria tamely
bowed out in the first round yesterday
with a 6-3, 6-2, 6-4 defeat by Bolivia’s
Hugo Dellien.
Sadly, Thiem is a shadow of his
former self after a nine-month absence
with a wrist injury. He has lost seven
straight matches since his return in
March, winning only one set in 16, and
is spraying forehand errors all over
the place.
“In practice the forehand is really
decent but then the match situation is
something different,” Thiem said. “At a
grand slam especially, I’m a little bit
more tight, more nervous and obvious-
ly the whole body gets more tight. Right
now that’s toxic to my forehand
because I’m still missing the fine
feeling there, I’m missing it a lot. If
that’s the case, many, many mistakes
are happening.”
The shock of the opening day came in
the women’s draw when one of the
main contenders fell at the first hurdle.
Ons Jabeur, the world No 6 from
Tunisia, came here with much
confidence after 17 match wins on clay,
including the Madrid Open title this
month, but crumbled under the
pressure in a 3-6, 7-6 (7-4), 7-5 loss to
Poland’s Magda Linette.
“I wanted to go as far as I could in the
tournament because I played well on
clay in Madrid and in Rome [where she
finished runner-up], and it’s difficult to
take that one in,” Jabeur said. “But that’s
what sport is like and you need to be
smart enough to move forward and get
back on court, so maybe it was a good
thing to lose today. I would rather say
this and be really tough with myself
than waste all the good energy that I got
from Madrid and Rome.”Brits in action today
Martina Trevisan v Harriet Dart
10am (UK time)
Cameron Norrie (10) v Manuel
Guinard approx 11.30am
Dan Evans (29) v Francisco
Cerundolo approx 11.30am
Heather Watson v Elsa Jacquemot
approx 11.30am
Linda Noskova v Emma Raducanu
(12) approx 2pmStuart Fraser
Tennis
Correspondent, ParisThe heir to the throne has passed his
first test. Carlos Alcaraz is the man who
many believe will eventually replace
Rafael Nadal in ruling the roost at
Roland Garros and he made an empha-
tic start to his campaign here last night.
The 19-year-old Spaniard, who has
made a stunning rise to world No 6 in
recent months, comfortably dispatched
Argentina’s Juan Ignacio Londero 6-4,
6-2, 6-0 for his 11th consecutive win.
Alcaraz’s first appearance on Court
Philippe Chatrier was reminiscent in
some ways of the first match an 18-year-
old Nadal contested on the main
court in Paris in 2005. Much of the
knowledgeable crowd were excited to
catch their first glimpse of this rising
star and in awe at times of the power
coming off his racket.
While Alcaraz has played down the
prospect of facing Nadal or Novak
Djokovic in the semi-finals,
aware that he has to overcome
another four opponents before
he reaches this stage, it is hard
for the rest of us at Roland
Garros not to look forward to
this possibility with anticipa-
tion. He defeated both players
in consecutive matches en
route to the Madrid Open title
this month but to do it here
on clay over the best of five
sets at the most gruelling
grand-slam tournament
really would mark a passing
of the torch.
Surprisingly, given that
Nadal and Djokovic boast
41 grand-slam trophies
between them, several
bookmakers rate Alcaraz as the
favourite. Nadal, who turns 36 next
week, has admittedly had troubling
issues in recent weeks with the chronic
pain in his left foot but he has overcome
physical adversity in the past here to
win some of his 13 French Open titles,
while Djokovic, 35, has recently
returned to form after winning the
Italian Open in Rome. Nadal and
Djokovic play their opening matches
today against Jordan Thompson and
Yoshihito Nishioka, respectively.
“If we talk about favourites for
Roland Garros and the clay, Nadal
always has to be right at the top because
of his records, particularly in this
tournament,”
Djokovic
said. “And
then you have
Alcaraz who
obviously is the
story of men’s tennis
in the last five months
with a big reason. He’s
had some tremendous
leaps forward in the
rankings, and the results
that he’s been achieving are
phenomenal for someone of his age.
He has made a quantum jump in the
last five months.
“I feel I am always in that conten-
tion to fight for any grand-slam tro-
phy. I believe in my own abilities to
get far and to fight for one of the
most prestigious trophies in
the world of tennis. As aThe beaten Thiem looks
a shadow of his old self
Alcaraz lost
only six games
as he cruised
to victory
over Londero