Roland Garros 2022: Thiem and Zverev get the finishing touches - with different signs
Dominic Thiem and Alexander Zverev will start the French Open 2022 tomorrow, Sunday. Saturday was used again for intensive training.
by Jens Huiber
last edit: May 21, 2022, 03:39 pm
By Jens Huiber from Roland Garros
The Kids Day at the French Open rightly passed Dominic Thiem without a trace, Austria's number one was not involved in the celebrations, thus saving himself what felt like a hundred and eighth performance by DJ Bob Sinclair, which basically can only have a positive effect on the course of the tournament. Meanwhile, Thiem was practicing with Marcos Giron at the Jean Bouin training center, to the exclusion of the public and journalists. The latter is an innovation at the French Open 2022.
Thiem will open Court Simonne-Mathieu on Sunday (live from 11 a.m. on our ticker, on Eurosport and in Austria on ServusTV), which is not a bad place to perhaps get back on track with the glorious performances at the Bois de Boulogne . Hugo Dellien isn't a bad starting point for that, the Bolivian hasn't exactly played stars from the sky in recent weeks. The 28-year-old, currently ranked 89th in the world, has at least played through the qualifying tournaments in Madrid, Estoril, Barcelona and Monte-Carlo and defeated the strong Dane Holger Rune in Rome. In the end, Schilling only had four victories in ATP main fields, Dominic Thiem doesn't have to worry.
Zverev trains with Sinner
In contrast to the game between Alexander Zverev and Sebastian Ofner, in which the German is the big favorite, the initial situation when Thiem meets Dellien for the first time is rather open. Yes, Dominic Thiem is still waiting for his first win after the comeback. But: The best-of-five format should suit the Lower Austrian, there was nothing wrong with fitness in previous performances.
Alexander Zverev goes into the second major of the year with different claims than Thiem. On Saturday, the Olympic champion from Tokyo first trained with Jannik Sinner on Court 7, in front of almost full stands. Training set or not: Good points were applauded by the fans, the general impression was that Zverev played significantly more good points than Sinner.
But what may also be necessary, as is well known, Zverev was drawn into the half that would go through as a “group of death” at any standard football World Cup.
Tsitsipas trains in match mode
Will Sebastian Ofner be able to contribute a bit to this? After qualifying, the Styrian comes with a healthy mix of self-confidence and match practice, and was even allowed to train on the Philippe-Chatrier court on Saturday evening (with Corentin Moutet). After all, it will be the second largest court against Zverev: The German-Austrian game is scheduled as the third on the Suzanne-Lenglen court (from around 2 p.m. in our live ticker). Zverev was there again a small part of the celebrations.
Interesting on Saturday, by the way: On some courts, training sets were played under competition conditions, with umpires, line judges, ball children and all the trimmings. Peter Gojowczyk dueled Quentin Halys in about 14th place. And Stefanos Tsitsipas even on the Philippe-Chatrier court with Pablo Cuevas. Tsitsipas still won 7: 5 after falling behind and was cheered by the crowd. And handed over almost seamlessly to Bob Sinclair, who had already positioned himself behind his mixer.
Here is the schedule for Sunday
Here is the individual tableau for men
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