Greek hero Tsitsipas pleased with his fightback on Parisian clay
Stefanos Tsitsipas held off a spirited comeback from Jiri Vesely to reach the second round of the French Open on Sunday with a four-set win.
The Greek fifth seed, who blew a two-set lead to lose the 2021 final to Novak Djokovic, won 7-5, 6-3, 4-6, 7-6 (9/7) on Court Philippe Chatrier. "The match was very inconsistent from my side," said Tsitsipas.
"I felt like I haven't played a match with so much inconsistency in a very long time.
"But otherwise I'm happy with how things turned around, and my fighting spirit kind of went on full display in those last few points of the tie-breaker."
He will next face either Spaniard Roberto Carballes Baena or qualifier Emilio Nava on Wednesday. Meanwhile, Aryna Sabalenka said she understood Marta Kostyuk's decision to skip customary post-match handshakes with Russian and Belarusian players following Moscow's conflict with her country Ukraine but the player did not deserve jeers from the French Open crowd.
Booing and jeering could be heard from the thin Court Philippe Chatrier crowd as Kostyuk left the venue after a 6-3 6-2 loss to Belarusian world number two Sabalenka on Sunday. "I understand why they're not shaking hands with us. I can imagine if they shake hands with us, what's going to happen to them from the Ukrainian side. I understand that this isn't personal. That's it," Sabalenka said.
American Sebastian Korda claimed his first victory since January by battling past Mackenzie Mcdonald on Sunday and said he had spent the last few months learning to play again after a wrist issue wrecked his strong start to 2023. Korda's hopes of emulating his father Petr's 1998 Australian Open triumph ended in pain as he retired with a wrist problem in the quarterfinal.
"I'd say I went two-three months without touching a racket. I even still had a little bit of pain in Madrid and Rome was the first tournament where I had nothing, which was a really big positive for me," said Korda, who won 6-4 7-5 6-4 on Sunday. —