Can Paris recover after a disastrous French Open?

Amélie Mauresmo has cause for concern following the French Open semi-final between Casper Ruud and Alexander Zverev saw thousands empty seats. Now with the Stade Roland Garros set to host the Olympic tennis tournament, organisers worry the issues may continue.

Amélie Mauresmo, the former world number 1, has been in charge of the tournament since December 2021 and this year there was a glaringly obvious sign that things aren't exactly working at the French Open: the number of empty seats on display during the semi-final between Casper Ruud and Alexander Zverev.

The match, scheduled just after the first semi-final between Carlos Alcaraz and Jannik Sinner, suffered from comparison with its predecessor. Spectators seemingly skipped the second semi-final after enjoying the first, big-name thriller – but was that actually the case?

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At a press conference following the match, Mauresmo was stern: “We are not satisfied with what we saw. We cannot accept seeing empty stands like that in a second semi-final,” she said, as reported by Barron's news agency.

So how did this happen? According to the Sports website: "only 10% of spectators had tickets for the two semi-finals, the rest of the public purchased tickets for only one of the two matches." This means that a lot of spectators had only bought their tickets for the second semi-final, but simply did not go to see it. Inexplicable!

Mauresmo is also at a loss to explain the situation. According to L'Équipe, the director explained: "Who knows? I'm not in their [the ticket buyers] heads. We were quite confident that people were going to come. It's complicated to say that people who have a ticket won't come."

Now it's time for solutions. Mauresmo is adamant that she already has “a number of ideas” to help avoid this situation in the future but isn't prepared to share them at this stage, as reported by ABC News.

"I will not give them today, I will not tell you what I thought about, we must discuss it, we must debate it, but believe me, we are not satisfied with what we have seen,” she concluded.

The main criticism leveled at Roland Garros concerns the public itself. There is a feeling among fans that all the best seats are distributed to corporate sponsors while the fan experience is being neglected.

Despite the implementation of dual ticketing several years ago, the problem is still the same: at meal times, the boxes are empty – and the other seats too. What's the solution to this? Do VIP tickets need to be limited too? Amélie Mauresmo has some big decisions to make...

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