"The crowd is enjoying themselves," says the Eurosport commentator about one of the matches at Roland Garros, one of the four main tennis competitions being held in Paris until June 11. What viewers see, on the other hand, are stands full of an audience willing to participate in the sporting battle with disturbing fury. The mistakes of the opponent are applauded, any slightest gesture of referees or players that calls into question or nullifies a point of the local star is whistled and booed. History repeats itself every time a French tennis player enters the court. A kind of nationalism with hooligan overtones is increasingly imposed in the sport of the racket, famous until recently for fair play and good education.
"Have fun", "have fun", are euphemisms for the inconsiderate and often intimidating behavior of large sections of the stands. The phenomenon is not new. It has been going on for a long time. Behaviour of this type has been seen at the Mutua Madrid Open and at the recent Master 1000 in Rome, but in the first two rounds of Roland Garros (the third round has not been Frenchmen in the singles), things have taken on capital dimensions. While Eurosport specialists and commentators speak with authority about playing styles or reel off the tennis history of the participants, viewers watch astonished what happens on the courts.
The British Cameron Norrie, victorious rival of two Frenchmen in the first two rounds, is booed and even chooses to apologize for his triumph, not without irony, when he is interviewed in front of the stands. The young Russian player Anna Blinkova, guilty of leaving Caroline Garcia on the road, great hope of French women's tennis and world number five, is dismissed with the utmost coldness and discourtesy. The Russian Daniil Medvedev, famous for his 'piques' with the public in countless tournaments, is outraged in his debut, on the main court, when he is booed for asking for the revision of a ball. Medvedev then turns to the more than 15,000 spectators and eloquently indicates that the issue does not concern them. The boos flare up. The hostility that American Taylor Fritz finds last Thursday against Frenchman Arthur Rinderknech will be much greater. The tumult prevents him from concentrating on the serve, and the audience whistles at the chair umpire, the British Alison Hughes, for not giving up a shot of "Arthur, Arthur!!!". After winning the match, Fritz turns to the stands and asks for silence by putting his index finger to his mouth, which causes a prolonged booing. When he returns to the track on Saturday, June 3, he will be greeted in the same way. The Eurosport commentator will recall the reasons, regretting the player's reaction despite acknowledging that he had to face "the hostility of the public". A hostility that can end up undermining the original spirit of a sport that has always presumed to be exquisitely civilized and correct.
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