French Open 2024, As Expected, Upset Exits, Strong Front Runners Prevail
FCI Staff Writer Sacramento 
fcielitecompetitor.com, fciwomenswrestling2.com, femcompetitor.com, grapplingstars.com fcielitecompetitor.com Shutterstock-Lev Radin photo-credit-Editorial-use-
June 5, 2024,
As expected?
Mostly.
There are upsets and the top players are still competing at the 2024 French Open.
Iga Swiatek, Coco Gauff, Ons Jabeur and Aryna Sabalenka are still here. As expected.
It is the upsets in any major Grand Slam that gives you pause for reflection. Now that the first week of play has ended, let’s back hand pedal and take a look at a few of them.
America’s Jessica Pegula made a decision to withdraw from the tournament. Playing on clay is not her strength coupled with injuries, she indicated she wanted get healthy and return later in the season.
We will miss her and miss analyzing her mostly perturbing play for a player ranked number five in the world who has yet to make a semi-final of a Grand Slam.
Which brings us to the world’s former number one in Naomi Osaka.
Naomi lost in the second round in three very tough sets to the tournament favorite in Iga Swiatek, but having given praise, she still lost. By Naomi’s standards, that has to be very disappointing.
The informative inside source tennisworldusa.org reported, “On Wednesday, two four-time Grand Slam champions delivered an epic battle, in which former world No. 1 Naomi Osaka fell just short. Swiatek, the defending French Open champion, was on the verge of losing the match but saved a match point in the third set and recovered from a 2-5 deficit before sealing a 7-6 (1) 1-6 7-5 win in three hours of play.”
It is understandable how someone can look at the match, as a Naomi Osaka fan, and mostly view the glass as half full.
On what may still seem like her comeback tour, after taking a long mental health and pregnancy break, Naomi is inching her way back towards the top. Having a match point on the tournament favorite is saying something. It’s simply the bad luck of the draw that she had to play Iga in the second round, in the first place.
That fate comes from not being a top ranked player.
ESPN provides some perspective. Speaking of Naomi, they post, “She struggled through the remainder of the 2021 season and throughout the next year, then spent the 2023 season on maternity leave. Osaka hadn’t won a match at a major since the 2022 Australian Open before her opening-round victory over Lucia Bronzetti on Sunday at the French Open.”
Naomi is currently ranked at 134 in the world, a far cry from her glory days but in all fairness, as many of us know, life happens unexpectedly and can throw some massive top spin at you.
When she was at the top, she could face the number 134-150 ranked players in the first and second rounds. Now that her fortunes have changed and her ranking has plummeted, she gets to face the Iga Swiateks of the world in the second round instead of the semi-finals or finals.
It could be a long climb back to the top for the elite social minded tennis star with a heart.
We will be rooting for her and watching.
The mighty 2024 US Open should be revealing. The expectations will be high.
As they currently are for American Danielle Collins who previously announced this will be her last year on the tour.
Here is her resume. While it lasts.
Danielle reached a career-high WTA rankings of No. 7 in singles and No. 79 in doubles.
She won her first WTA Tour title in 2021 at the Palermo Ladies Open and has won four singles titles in total, including a WTA 1000 title at the 2024 Miami Open, and one doubles title.
Drum roll please.
She reached a major singles final at the 2022 Australian Open.
Danielle played collegiate tennis at the University of Virginia and won the NCAA singles title twice, during her sophomore and senior years in 2014 and 2016.
She finished her career in Virginia as the top-ranked collegiate player.
Having first established herself on the WTA Tour when she reached the semifinals of the 2018 Miami Open as a qualifier, her breakthrough came at the 2019 Australian Open where she advanced to the semifinals, defeating world No. 2 Angelique Kerber en route.
She has never looked back. Her fiery and passionate style of play excited fans world over so her entry into the 2024 French Open was closely watched.
Unfortunately it was short lived.
Danielle was defeated at her final Roland Garros competition in the second round, losing to Olga Danilovic, 6-7 (3), 7-5, 6-4.
The inside source at tennis.com posted, “Collins, who plans to retire at the end of the 2024 season, arrived in Paris as a dark horse contender for the title after compiling a 15-3 record on clay that helped her return to the Top 10. But the No. 11 seed couldn’t convert a set and break advantage against the Serbian qualifier.”
We still have the 2024 US Open and we are certain Danielle will get a supper boost from the partisan American crowd.
Another popular American was ousted.
Emma Navarro vanquished American Madison Keys 7-6 (5), 7-6 (3).
Madison has been ranked as high as world No. 7 by the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA), which she first achieved in October 2016.
The American luminary has contested a Major singles final at the 2017 US Open, competed at the 2016 WTA Finals, and was a semifinalist at the 2016 Rio Olympics.
She has won eight WTA Tour tournaments, six of which were at the Premier level, and won her biggest title at the 2019 Cincinnati Open, a Premier 5 event.
Madison’s loss to fellow American Sloane Stevens in 2017 seems so long ago. Still, we know what Madison is capable of. She was just a heartbeat away from winning it all.
The expectations for Madison are always high and yet fans are still waiting for Madison to win that highly coveted Grand Slam title. She will get her chance as well at the 2024 US Open.
So for now, at this year’s 2024 French Open, as far as the front runners go, things appear to be going as expected.
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OPENING PHOTO Lev Radin Shutterstock-photo-credit-Editorial-use- fcielitecompetitor.com, fciwomenswrestling2.com, femcompetitor.com, grapplingstars.com fcielitecompetitor.com
https://www.tennisworldusa.org/tennis/news/Tennis_Stories/145005/naomi-osaka-dismisses-iga-swiatek-complaint-after-french-open-thriller/ https://www.espn.com/tennis/story/_/id/40229317/2024-french-open-naomi-osaka-iga-swiatek
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danielle_Collins
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madison_Keys
https://www.fciwomenswrestling2.com
https://www.fcielitecompetitor.com/
https://fciwomenswrestling.com/
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