Scheduling woes take centre stage again as Coco Gauff set for middle of the night in US at Roland Garros

WTA
Tuesday, 04 June 2024 at 01:21
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The drama surrounding scheduling of matches at Roland Garros continues as top-ranked American Coco Gauff is set to resume her French Open campaign on Tuesday, albeit at an unreasonable time for American viewers.
The reigning US Open champion will kick off the day's proceedings when she takes on Tunisian Ons Jabeur in the quarterfinals. However, their anticipated encounter has been scheduled for an early morning set in Paris, which corresponds to 5.00am EST American time.

Fans in the United States unhappy with match scheduling

Considering Gauff is the biggest active tennis star, male or female, in the United States, one would imagine her match would take place at an hour when most American fans would be awake. However, the release of the schedule sees the Atlanta native face Jabeur in a pivotal quarterfinal match at an hour when most of her local fans would be asleep.
BBC commentator David Law took to social media to voice his opinion on the matter. The British broadcaster speculated at the wisdom of having Gauff play at a time when her home fans would be unable to watch her compete.
"I have a lot of thoughts about the scheduling of this tennis tournament. But let’s put all of them aside for a moment and focus on this: Can someone, anyone, explain the logic of putting America’s biggest current tennis star, Coco Gauff, on in the middle of the night in the US?" wrote Law on Twitter.
His statements come in the wake of the scheduling issues at Roland Garros that have seen players finish matches after midnight Parisian time. A prime example would be World No.1 Novak Djokovic's third round win over Lorenzo Musetti, a marathon match that saw the Serbian prevail at 3:06am Parisian time. Both men set a new record by participating in the latest match finish in French Open history.

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