In the end, it was all a bit anticlimatique. Much of French tennis had gathered for the final of the last ever edition of the Paris Masters in Bercy, before it moves to La Défense next year, in the hope of hailing a home winner, Ugo Humbert. But Alexander Zverev ultimately delivered a fairly savage beatdown of Humbert and French hopes, reminding what remains probably the most tennis-mad country in the world just how far it has to go to produce a male Major winner for the first time in over 40 years.
To The Victor The Spoils
Before considering just how disappointing the defeat was for Humbert in particular and French tennis in general, it is necessary to pay tribute to the victor in Paris. Alexander Zverev was at his imperious best in defeating Humbert 6-2 6-2, proving that at his best he remains one of the finest players in the world and certainly the best current player not to have won a Major singles title.
In boxing terminology, it was like watching a heavyweight defeat a middleweight, or even light-middleweight, as Zverev completely overwhelmed Humbert with his power, accuracy and sheer reach, especially on the backhand side, which allowed him for the most part to neutralise Humbert’s serve and then deploy his own lazer-like serve to devastating effect.
Playing like this, with all his obvious physical attributes on full display (not least his 6 ft 6 in frame, which allows him to make so many unreturnable serves), Zverev looks like he should be the best player in the world. Of course, the challenge for him is to beat players better than Humbert, namely Jannik Sinner, Carlos Alcaraz and Novak Djokovic, over five sets in a Major final, which so far he has been unable to do.
And To The Loser The Inquest
The big problem for Ugo Humbert and indeed any of the other French players who did so well in Paris last week, including Arthur Fils and Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard, is that if they are to win a Major they will have to beat even better players than Zverev. And given that Zverev defeated both Humbert and Fils to win in Paris-Bercy for the first time, that will obviously not be an easy task.
The hopes of French fans that they might say au revoir to Bercy, the atmospheric indoor stadium that has hosted indoor sailing and windsurfing as well as tennis over the years, were raised during the week as no fewer than five French players reached the last 16. Three of them – Fils, Cazaux and Rinderknech – were even called Arthur, prompting the belief that France might finally be able to hail a new king or roi of tennis.
Unfortunately, all three Arthurs crashed out in the last 16, alongside Adrian Mannarino, leaving Ugo Humbert as the only remaining Frenchman in the last eight. Nevertheless, such was the magnitude of Humbert’s last 16 win, beating no less a player than Carlos Alcaraz by breaking his serve in the final game of the match, that there was genuine belief that he could go all the way and win the biggest title of his career.
That belief was strengthened as Humbert made it to the final in Bercy, defeating Australia’s Jordan Thompson in the quarter-final and Russia’s Karen Khachanov in the semi-final, with the Frenchman clinching victory in the last-four match after Khachanov succumbed to an injury late in the third set.
Khachanov visibly upbraided Humbert for what he considered over or excessive celebration of his victory against a wounded opponent, but Humbert looked shocked at the accusation, perhaps believing that he had been so completely in the moment that he had not appreciated the full severity of Khachanov’s injury. Regardless, Humbert seemed perfectly set for the final against Zverev, in front of his home fans and much of the French tennis hierarchy in the last ever edition of the tournament at its original home.
That was why the final outcome was so profoundly disappointing for Humbert and all his supporters. Far from being able to rally the crowd to his side as he had done throughout the tournament, Humbert appeared barely able to rally at all with Zverev, as the enormous power and incredible accuracy of the German’s serves and groundstrokes seemed to render him completely impotent. He was unable to recover from the loss of the first set, as he had done against Khachanov, and was ultimately unable to alter the course of the match in any meaningful way. Zverev veritably cantered to victory.
The French Contenders
Partly as a result of his exploits in Paris, Humbert is the French No.1 but as the earlier results in the tournament had suggested he is only one of a number of fine young French male players who are ready to challenge at the very top of the sport. Arthur Fils is probably the most celebrated and Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard is probably the most powerful (which is perhaps not surprising given that he is even taller than Zverev), but there are also several other fine French male players, such as Cazaux and Luca Van Assche, the former French Open Junior Champion.
Can any one of them finally compete for and even win a Major Singles title, ending France’s long wait for a new male Grand Slam champion? That wait now stretches back over four decades to Yannick Noah’s 1983 French Open win, which is so long ago that Noah did so with a wooden racket. The size and ardour of the crowd at Bercy for the Paris Masters was further proof, if it were needed, of how much this tennis-mad if not tennis-obsessed nation craves a new hero.
There are some who would argue that this new generation of French contenders are not even as gifted as the last generation of Gasquet, Monfils, Tsonga, Simon and Pouille. But there is a major, and Major, difference in their chances of winning a Grand Slam, namely that they will not have to beat all (or perhaps even any) of The Big Three to do so.
That is probably the single biggest source of hope for Humbert, Fils, GMP and all the French fans who long for one of them to win a Major. If Humbert’s crushing defeat by Zverev was a reminder of the task that lies ahead if they are to win one of the sport’s four greatest prizes, then at least they know they will not have to beat the three greatest players of all time to do so.
Main photo credit: Dan Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports
