A Day @ Roland Garros

All tennis players dream about playing at Roland Garros during their career. Good ones’ amongst them aim for winning it. Outstanding ones’ have the motivation to win it time and again. Not only Roland Garros they want to win a grand-slam, if not a career gland-slam. You may call it an irony or whatever but for someone like me who hold a tennis racquet only in his adulthood watching a grand-slam is as good as having participated in it. If it’s a final of grand-slam event, it’s like playing a grand-slam finale.

I had applied for the Roland Garros tickets for both Men’s and Women’s Single’s Finals to be played on PHILIPPE CHATRIER Court (Center Court) at Roland Garros. Given a choice, I would have liked to watch Men’s Singles (Rafael Nadal versus Roger Federer would be an icing on the cake) final and when my application for 2 tickets for the Women’s singles finals was accepted I was equally excited. While I was betting on Maria Sharapova versus Ana Ivanovic for the finals, Maria Sharapova lost to Dinara Safina in the 4^th round and the final was between Dinara Safina of Russia versus Ana Ivanovic of Serbia. I would love Ana to win but only after fighting for 3 sets. The prolonged 3 setter mimicking Monica Seles and Steffi Graph in 1992 (Score line: 6–2, 3–6, 10–8) would be a dream final to watch.

Basa, a tennis enthusiast from Leuven accompanied me to watch the finale. I hope what he saw improves his game a bit. I am too hopeless to even hope to improve my tennis. We did not want to take any chance with trains etc. and reached Paris a day earlier using a set of slow IC trains that would fit our budget. Next day morning, we were supposed to be at the gate at 10AM sharp when the gates would open. During our stroll to the stadium, there were folks selling tickets for the finals. Both Men’s and Women’s tickets were available. I asked Basa how much he could shell out for Nadal – Federer match the next day. He responded 150 EUR. I said I could stretch up to 200 EUR. When we enquired the prize was 1000 EUR for 2 tickets. We quietly walked to the entrance.

As we entered, the schedule for the day was on display. There were 2 Legends’ doubles semi-finals, Junior’s semi-finals; Men’s doubles finals in addition to the grand Women’s Singles Finals. Surfeit tennis for the day. After about 45 minutes of modeling and photographing in the stadium, we were very surprised that the entire stadium is almost empty and I had an apprehension if we were at the right place. The referees and ball boys took their places at about 11am and the scoreboard flashed. The match to be played was Michael Stich/Goran Ivanišević versus Pat Cash/Sergei Bruguera. The players made their appearances and started to warm-up. I and Basa were lost. This was not expected. We went out to check out on the other courts. I was wondering if the final was to be played at some other court and in that case my booking for the centre court would have been useless and we won’t be able to watch the grand event. Panic situation!!! We came out. We could identify the PHILIPPE CHATRIER Court and were eager to enter. The Roland Garros personnel stopped us and in his franchised English involving a lot of gestures informed us that the Women’s singles match would start @ 3.00pm on PHILIPPE CHATRIER Court and we could be allowed to enter only during that time. I was relieved. To our surprise, a single PHILIPPE CHATRIER Court ticket was a passport to the entire Roland Garros matches for the day. So we came back to watch legends in action at SUZANNE LENGLEN Court.

Trophie De Legende’s
By the time we came back, the warm-up was over and the action was about to start. Being a legends match, there was no seriousness in air. All the players were enjoying themselves. Pat Cash was the funniest of all four. He was playing soccer with the ball boys, joking around as the match was being played. No wonder his first serve was broken by the opponents and suddenly they were trailing 1-3 in the first set. All four were real artists. The way they were handling the ball was amazing. Sergie showed his brilliance first up. While taking Stich’s serve he made a starting movement to take the ball on his forehand. But as he saw that the ball was going to his back hand he rotated and tried to hit the ball back…..almost succeeded. In his second serve Pat Cash was brilliant. One of his serves to Goran spun as much as Shane Warne’s ball that got out Mike Gatting….many call this ball as the ball of the century. Goran was baffled and applauded the ace. Goran’s pace of serve was still a notch up than his contemporaries. He was still serving at 200kmph and the difference was conspicuous. There was such bonhomie between all four that all the good passing shots/drops were applauded by the opponents and the objective of game was more of fun than that of competition. After missing a simple smash, Michael Stich went and handed over his racquet to a photographer. In another incident, the ball was high up in the air and anybody could have hit a smash. Goran came forward faster to hit it even when Stich was nearer to the ball. After the point Stitch shouted “I know I am bad but I am not that bad”. Stadium guffawed. I wonder if they would have ever done it when they were professionals.

Although, Sergie and Pat Cash managed to take the first set to the tie breaker, they lost match in two straight sets. Next match was another legend’s game. After the initial games in the first set, we decided to go out and grab some food.

Basa Scores an Ace
As we came out, the area was filled with band music. They were practicing for the main event: Women’s Singles finals. One photographer was busy with a model. Offf!!! French girls are too beautiful. I also wanted to take her picture but my Canon 400D was too inferior compared to his camera and I restrained. I tried to voyeur in a picture pretending to take the picture of the statue behind but looking at the picture now I have screwed up both: The object as well as the statue in the picture. We went ahead and saw a bunch of photographers and fans assembled at the entrance of Court 4. Curious to know what is happening we entered the court. Basa shouted “Nadal….Nadal.....” and disappeared. Indeed Rafael Nadal had his practice session and was about to leave. I was trying to take some pictures with my camera. Nadal was giving autographs to his fans. I tried to look for a paper or something that I can use to take his photograph. I had nothing except pen. All I could do is to take a couple of Nadal’s pictures amidst crowd. After a while, triumphant Basa appeared from the crowd flashing Nadal’s autograph on one of the papers. We were very happy. That was obviously the highlight of the day. Basa now has Rafael Nadal’s – Four time Roland Garros Champion’s autograph.

In the afternoon, we had a look at the Roland Garros’s museum. It was quite good. The evolution of racquets, cameras, dresses, trophies in the tennis world was on display. We would have spent more time in the museum but it was time for the gala event and we rushed to watch the Women’s Singles final at Centre court.

Ana Wins her first French Open
This time the atmosphere was entirely different. The tension, the anticipation, the excitement was in the air as we entered the stadium in a huge queue. The band was playing at the court before the event, signifying its greatness. The stadium was slowly but surely filling in. As I reached our seat (Escalator 10; Line 9; Seats: 122 & 124), I asked the guy sitting on my right to whom they are supporting. He proudly answered Serbia. On our left there were Russian fans. The flags were waving amidst an electrifying atmosphere. Ana made an appearance first waving the crowd. She was wearing a red outfit almost matching the surface. One fan in the crowd carried a banner “Ana, I am single too….”. As she entered the court, her entire route to the finals was announced and displayed on the screen. The same was for Dinara except that she was in her whites with a blue bordered skirt.

From the outset, I thought Ana’a body language was very positive. She was up and ready to go for the practice in a flash. Dinara took her time and both of them started warming up for the Big game of their lives.

I was supporting Ana to start with and she broke Dinara’s serve in the first game of the first set. I wanted a 3 setter and so I shifted and started supporting Dinara along with the other Russians on my left. Dinara has a lot of powerful shots and was indeed matching Ana shot-by-shot after the first game. Ana was more deceptive and was taking an initiative early in the game. She made a lot of unforced errors in a process too but was in more control. I also thought Ana was difficult to read because of subtle drop shots she played in between. She kept Dinara guessing. Dinara played well in patches and started variations a bit late in the match. In the end, the score line read 6-4; 6-3 in favor of Ana. Third attempt at the title was finally successful for Ana. I thought the match was better contested than the score line suggests.

Serbian on my right was entertaining through out the match. As soon as the point starts, he would shout “Back hand….back hand…”. He wanted Ana to hit every ball to Dinara’s back hand. The French Open crowd was excellent. The clapping cheer they offer a lagging player in order to boost his confidence can’t be described in words. In between, the fans would shout for Justin (Henin) who was in the crowd as the Chief Guest to hand over the trophy. Obviously they have not forgotten her dominance over clay. Most of the crowd was neutral and wanted a keenly fought 3 set contest. At the awards distribution ceremony Serbian national anthem was played. Ana was very emotional on the screen while the fan next to me was even more emotional than her. I wish I could stand up for an Indian national anthem @ Roland Garros one day. Sania….are you listening??

After the Finale, Basa thought of riding his good fortunes and rushed to see if he can get an opportunity to sneak another set of autographs. Unfortunately it was not to be...
I guess the 4^th round weekend should be a very conducive time to collect photographs of many tennis stars. I should go and try my luck…may be next time...

Should we buy Nadal versus Federer tickets?
After watching Mens’ doubles finale on the center court we encircled Roland Garros in an attempt to find a metro station. On our way, we confronted another ticket seller. Basa said: “How about 600 EUR for 2 tickets? A lifetime opportunity….” He was obviously excited. I said okay. We enquired and the guy was immediately willing to offer us 2 tickets for 600 EUR. I remembered a simple rule for bargain on the Mumbai’s fashion street: “If vendor agrees to your quoted prize first up, you have overestimated the prize.” The ticket was indeed further up the lines and we wouldn’t have been even closer to the court compared to women’s finale. Had it been behind the players or playing area, it would still have been worth for Nadal-Federer match. Adding to this, if we decide to watch the Men’s finals, we would have to manage our return ticket and the stay for the night. It would have been a pain. I decided to back off. Basa was disappointed. Looking at the result the next day it proved to be a blessing in disguise as Nadal pounced Federer 6-1,6-3,6-0. There was hardly any contest….

I wish I would be able to watch all grand slam finales in this life time. Next year’s target is Wimbledon. I have already initiated the ground work. US Open (have been to Flushing Maedows but have not seen any match) and Australian open are far away for now but I am hopeful that my days would come and I can proudly say I too have a career grand-slam.