PARIS — For the fourth French Open in a row, tournament director Amélie Mauresmo was asked about a lack of women's matches during the tournament's night sessions — there was one in 2022, one in 2023, zero in 2024 and, so far, zero in 2025.
And for the fourth French Open in a row, Mauresmo dismissed the issue, saying at a news conference Friday, when she also was pressed about placing women's matches in the noon slot at Court Philippe-Chatrier, when attendance tends to be sparse: "The funny thing is that it's the same questions, year after year."
At the other Grand Slam tennis tournaments that sell separate tickets for night sessions, the U.S. Open and Australian Open, the main stadiums tend to feature two singles matches for that part of the daily schedule, one involving women and one involving men. Wimbledon has an 11 p.m. cutoff for competition and doesn't sells tickets for a night session.
Roland-Garros added night sessions starting three years ago and the French federation has a contract with a streaming service for viewers in the home country that calls for one daily match in European primetime for the first 1 1/2 weeks of the event.
With Novak Djokovic set to play Filip Misolic on Saturday, only two of the 37 contests at night will have been women's matches.
Mauresmo, a former player who was ranked No. 1 and won two Grand Slam titles, took over as tournament director ahead of the 2022 tournament. She repeatedly has offered similar explanations for why the night match has almost always been a men's match, including that their best-of-five-set format is likely to offer more time on court for ticket-buyers than the best-of-three setup for women.
In recent years, some female players have argued that's a mistake and hurts the growth of their sport, although Mauresmo said Friday that no current or former athletes have complained to her about it or offered their thoughts.
Ons Jabeur, a three-time Grand Slam runner-up, was asked about the topic this week and called the current setup ''a shame.''
