While the qualifications of the Roland-Garros tournament will start on May 19, French tennis is far, very far from touching the sublime. As a sign that nothing is going well for the female, the Captain of Blue, Julien Benneteau, was thanked and dismissed from his functions a few days ago, after six years at the head of the French team. Six months after the team relegation to the second step of the Billie Jean King Cup and a few days after the failure of the operation raised among the elite, the observation is final: “We arrived at the end of a cycle. It was necessary for Julien to switch the torch to a new captain who can promote a new dynamic to this team ”, thus declared the president of the French Tennis Federation (FFT), Gilles Moretton.
The French women were indeed relegated in November 2024 after a defeat in Colombia and hardly more shone during a promotion-relegation tournament in Vilnius, Lithuania. Beaten by Turkey and Belgium, the Bleues were unable to win sesame allowing them to reintegrate the group from the best world nations in 2026. “Some players have been exemplary while others have not assumed their responsibilities”, had said at the time a Julien Benneteau, disillusioned by the attitude of Diane Parry and Caroline Garcia.
Try to straighten the bar
But where did the Mary Pierce (Australian Open 1995, Roland Garros 2000), Amélie Mauresmo (Australia Open and Wimbledon 2006) or Marion Bartoli (Wimbledon 2013) Not a single girl today in the top 10, the top 20 … you have to go beyond the 60e Place to find Varvara Gracheva (24 years old) in 66e position then, even further, Léolia Jeanjean (29) at the 107e Place and Diane Parry (22) at 116e. As for Caroline Garcia, best French player in recent years, she has been at 31 years old at 117e Place, while in 2018 it entered the world top 5.
A year ago, Varvara Gracheva, of Russian origin but naturalized French, had been the only one to reach the knockout stages at the Porte d’Auteuil. The same year, Océane Dodin had also failed in the round of 16 of the Australian Open. And then that’s it. Not to say worse. In Madrid a few days ago, Diane Parry painfully reached the second round, before getting out.
At the head of the FFT, we widen the Meninces to try to straighten the bar and put the French boat backfold. Long placed aside to make room for the boys, it would seem that today the message begins to get across and that girls are now a little more considered. We are still far from the account, since to date only 20 young players are supported by the FFT. But that is advancing, in particular thanks to the implementation for three years of a France women’s pole in Poitiers. The fact remains that the sites are still in size for Didier Retière, the new national technical director, and Ivan Ljubicic, head of the high level.
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