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The real surprise here was that it took so long to come. Moïse Kouamé had expertly handled his nerves and high expectations to begin his first French Open main draw match on the front foot, he had demonstrated his enormous promise by playing so well, and he had paired his form with total self-assurance. Finally, with the 17-year-old up two sets to love and on his way to a perfect start, his 5,000-strong audience responded with an impromptu rendition of La Marseillaise.
Their crooning provided the soundtrack for one of the statement wins of the tournament as Kouamé, the latest young star to command France’s attention, underlined his massive promise by spectacularly closing out his first grand slam match with a 7-6 (4), 6-2, 6-1 win over the former US Open champion Marin Cilic. Kouamé is the youngest player to win a men’s singles grand slam match since 2009 and the youngest at Roland Garros since 1991.
This result had been building for some time. A finalist at the prestigious Orange Bowl junior tournament in 2024, Kouamé first truly caught the public’s attention at the beginning of this year when he followed up an ITF title in Bressuire by grinding through two tough victories to qualify for his first ATP main draw in Montpellier in February, a month before his 17th birthday. Kouamé then reached the semi-final of a Challenger in Lille. Even in such low-profile tournaments, his progress was followed intensely by French tennis fans and media.
Those early successes and Kouamé’s affiliation with the agency IMG naturally opened him up to a world of opportunities, with wildcards at the Masters 1000 events in Miami, Monte Carlo and Madrid over the past few months setting the stage for his first time competing in front of a home crowd in Paris.
No nation is as desperate for its next great male player as France, a tennis-mad country still searching for Yannick Noah’s successor 43 years after his French Open triumph. The enormous hype that has surrounded Kouamé since the start of the year has led to conversations about the role fans and the media play in the development of an athlete, whether they have a duty to temper the hype and allow the player to develop at their own pace or if this is something that simply comes with the territory.
The spotlight on Kouamé has already been intense, but this victory plainly underlined why it exists. The teenager’s serve is enormous for his age, scaling 139mph (223km/h) on Tuesday as, adrenaline driving him on, he furiously consolidated his decisive break in set two. He may have plenty of time to develop physically, but Kouamé is already a supreme athlete – incredibly fast around the court and capable of a sliding open stance off both wings. His two-handed backhand is incredibly solid and he barely missed a forehand against Cilic. Still, the most impressive quality was his composure.
While Kouamé brilliantly narrowed the court with his defensive skills and smartly chose the right moments to attack, this result was also possible thanks to a dire performance from the Cilic, the 2014 US open champion, who wilted in the searing heat.
At 37 years old, the Croatian is in the final stretch of his distinguished career. This time, he had the opportunity to witness the impressive beginnings of another.
“I’m 17, and I have won one grand slam match,” said Kouamé. “I don’t think that my opponent today thought: ‘Oh, he’s 17.’ He was trying to play his best, and same for me. I didn’t care about his age. I just wanted to give him shots that were as complicated to play as possible.
“So for some, the age factor may play a role, but as far as I’m concerned, I tried to focus, not to think about it, because in the end, when you’re on court, you don’t think about your age or what you’re going to eat. You think about what you have to do to win.”
Elsewhere, the sixth seed, Daniil Medvedev, became the biggest first-round casualty in Paris as he suffered a 6-2, 1-6, 6-1, 1-6, 6-4 loss to Adam Walton of Australia. Cameron Norrie, the British No 1, was forced to retire from his first round match while trailing Adolfo Daniel Vallejo 7-6 (7), 2-0.
Norrie, who had never previously retired from a tour match in his career, had entered the tournament nursing a rib injury. He felt pain while striking his backhand, return and even while breathing before he finally decided to stop.
