Roland Garros Day 5 diary and highlights: Murray, Bouchard and more

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  • It was that kind of day for some.

    On a day that witnessed few upsets but lots of drama and emotion, Andy Murray had his favourite argument with the umpire about the Spidercam, Eugenie Bouchard showed up late to her match, and Juan Martin del Potro melted hearts worldwide.

    Murray had a tough time on court against an inspired Martin Klizan before he advanced in four tight sets. During the match, the world No1 threatened the umpire he would sit down if the Spidercam kept turning up in his line of vision while he was serving.

    This is not a new pet peeve of Murray’s. He hates that thing. He elaborated once again in press.

    “I don’t like it when the Spidercam is – I don’t know how many times I have spoken about it in here. You guys know, I don’t like it when it’s in my ball toss. And it was there at the beginning of the match. It was the same thing yesterday in the first round. It happened three or four times in the first round where it was there. I asked for it to be moved. They moved it. Then it comes back,” said Murray.

    “I just don’t like it there. It puts me off, and I asked a few times today, and it kept coming back. I just said, If it’s there in my ball toss again, I’m going to sit down and wait for it to move, you know, because I just don’t feel I should have to be asking for it every change of ends to not be there. It’s quite a simple thing to change.”

    We apologise on the French Open’s behalf, Sir Andy!

    Meanwhile, Bouchard turned up several minutes late for her second round against Anastasija Sevastova on Court 2. Players usually step on court together so it was a bit unusual when she didn’t show up on time.

    She explained later what happened.

    “Well, there was a retirement before (Almagro retired on the same court against Del Potro). So, I mean, I had to do my whole routine. I had to get my ankle taped. I can’t just do everything in 10 minutes,” said the Canadian.

    Asked how her opponent got there before her she said: “She ran ahead of me, I don’t know.”

    In a heartbreaking moment in the Nick Kyrgios press conference, a reporter asked him if he could talk about his late grandfather who passed away five weeks ago. Kyrgios was very close to his grandfather and told us it’s been difficult to find motivation for tennis since his death.

    In attempt to respond to the reporter’s question, Kyrgios said without looking us in the eye: “I mean, it was — yeah, when I was back home, it was tough. I mean, I can’t talk about it. I can’t.”

    We were all smart enough to let him go after that.

    Here’s a look at how day 5 went down at Roland Garros…

    (Worst) Points of the day

    There were plenty of impressive points today, but I prefer to highlight these two atrocities from Tatjana Maria and Martin Klizan instead.

    Maria did this:


    While Klizan did this to get broken while serving for the fourth set:


    Stats of the day

    19 — weeks since Agnieszka Radwanska had won back-to-back matches prior to Thursday

    30 — men aged 30 or over reached the second round in Paris, an Open era record at a Grand Slam

    67 — unforced errors committed by Martin Klizan in his four set second round defeat to Andy Murray

    78 — minutes, the length of the fourth set between Murray and Klizan – longest set of the day

    Quotes of the day

    “I wish. It’s not that easy, especially comparing me to Federer, let’s come back to reality.”
    – Agnieszka Radwanska when asked if she would ‘pull a Federer’ and skip the clay season altogether in the future

    “Get me a beer now. Get me one right now. Honest to God.”
    – Nick Kyrgios, on court, after dropping serve in game three of the fourth set in his loss to Kevin Anderson. Because, why not?

    “No. I could be close, between you and me.”

    — John Isner when told his next opponent Karen Khachanov is married at the age of 20 while the American was not. Not sure how Isner thought his answer would be “between him and the reporter”.

    Upset of the day

    Karen Khachanov bt. Tomas Berdych [13] 7-5, 6-3, 6-1

    Playing his first Roland Garros main draw, and just his third Grand Slam overall, Khachanov upset 2010 semi-finalist Berdych in a two-hour 13-minute affair.

    GIFs of the day

    Fail of the day

    Anna Chakvetadze and her fellow Eurosport presenters/commentators went around asking Roland Garros fans to pronounce difficult Russian surnames. Which is a hilarious idea. It all went well until Chakvetadze decided to say ‘arigato’ (thank you in Japanese) to a woman from Taiwan. It’s beyond me why they didn’t edit it out.


    Tweet of the day

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