The Paris Indoors main draw wildcard allocation was not friendly for the younger French players. Instead Paris Indoors doled out wildcards into the main draw to three French players all over the age of 34.
Adrian Mannarino, age 34 and ranked 42… Gilles Simon, age 37 and ranked 195… Richard Gasquet, age 36 and ranked 74. The other wildcard recipient is Arthur Rinderknech, age 27 and ranked 51.
Simon is retiring next week, so a wildcard for his last ATP tournament in Paris, makes sentimental sense for the former world no. 6 and winner of 14 ATP singles titles and 502 matches overall.
But there are a lot of rising, young French players who needed and deserved the opportunity, like teenager Arthur Fils, Corentin Moutet, Hugo Gaston, Hugo Grenier, Luca Van Assche or Constant Lestienne. Or how about the down and almost out but always flashy Benoit Paire, now ranked 177 at age 33?
I suppose Mannarino, Gasquet and Simon are worthy because of their excellent careers and appealing playing styles.
Jose Higueras once said he felt somewhat offended by getting a wildcard, “because it meant he wasn’t working hard enough.”
Cory · November 1, 2022 at 2:31 pm
What a win by Simon. Murray really needed to finish the season strongly and couldn’t. For Simon it’s retiring another day – unless we somehow wins it then he has points to play onward perhaps 🙂
Scoop Malinowski · November 1, 2022 at 7:01 pm
Cory, Murray was 16-2 career vs Gillou, maybe Murray has lost his mojo, remember at Wimbledon he also lost for the first time ever to Isner and before that loss he said he was feeling really good and that his form was good enough to contend for the title. So losing to Simon is another devastating loss. Despite the dozens of wildcards, Murray is just an average player now, his ranking is inflated by those WCs.
Cory · November 1, 2022 at 10:03 pm
Agreed fully, you’ve mentioned a few times now how benevolent tourneys have been to Murray. Give him credit tho for winning enough to at least earn being a top 50 mainstay (altho with the help of endless WCs) – which as you point out is exactly where he should be. He has not been the top 10 dominant player at all and we’ve certainly seen the last of that Murray. But he should be able to win a few more 250s and 500s.
Scoop Malinowski · November 2, 2022 at 8:08 am
Cory, Murray is done, he put every effort into regaining his level as a top player this year and he failed, he’s an average player now. Next year will not be any better. The losses to Simon this week and Isner at Wimbledon crushed his self belief.