Roland-Garros: Mauresmo defends the evening session with only one match

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We didn't want to finish at two o'clock in the morning": Roland-Garros director Amélie Mauresmo on Sunday defended the format of evening sessions with only one match, when two are scheduled at the Australian Open and the US Open. And the boss of the French lifting of the Grand Slam does not intend to deviate from this line. "That's what we're going to do, beyond this year," she said.

To discover

• Roland Garros Men's Singles
• Roland Garros Women's Singles

The formula chosen by Roland-Garros, with only one match scheduled from 20:15 for the 2023 edition - half an hour earlier than in 2022 - raises the question of the very unbalanced distribution between male and female posters in the evening.

Sunday night, the eighth final between Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka, world No. 2, and American Sloane Stephens is the first women's match to have the honors of the "night session" since the beginning of the Parisian fortnight, after six first men's posters.

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In 2022, only one evening session was devoted to a women's match. "We didn't want, like other Grand Slams, to finish at two, three, four in the morning," Mauresmo said.

As for possibly advancing the start of the session, the former world N.1 observes that "we are still addressing a rather Ile-de-France audience, Parisian, a few foreigners too. But overall, the public comes to consume as you go to the theater or a concert, so I do not believe in 19:00 with two matches, "she continues, acknowledging, however, "a lot of internal debates". "I don't think the party ticket holders arrive at 18:00 p.m., 18:30 p.m. in the stadium, right to be on the court at 19:00 p.m. and stay until I don't know what time," she adds.

At the Australian Open and the US Open, two matches are scheduled in evening sessions, starting at 19:00. "It's a new niche for us," says Mauresmo. There's real work being done." As a reminder, Roland-Garros has been offering "night sessions" since 2021.