French Open star retires in tears and walks off court after losing nine straight games | Tennis | Sport

Alexandre Muller’s meeting with Stefanos Tsitsipas at the French Open ended in tears when the Frenchman was forced to retire in the second set. Muller was already well on his way to losing the match, having conceded the opening set 6-2 in the blistering heat. He had initially taken the lead with a hold of serve and a break, but Tsitsipas battled back in devastating fashion.

Muller ended up losing the next nine games to find himself 6-2 3-0 down at the time of his retirement. After losing his eighth game in a row, the 29-year-old was visibly in pain and called for a medical timeout so that he could receive treatment. He appeared to be struggling with a calf injury and was still moving gingerly upon his return to the court.

Unfortunately, he was unable to play on for much longer, losing one more game before throwing in the towel and approaching the net to shake Tsitsipas’ hand.

Muller was clearly devastated and began to cry as he trudged off the court. He has endured a disappointing campaign to date, losing more matches than he has won.

He was recently dumped out of the Geneva Open in the first round, slipping to a one-sided defeat at the hands of Edas Butvilas.

Muller also suffered early exits in Madrid and Rome after failing to qualify for the main draw of the Barcelona Open last month.

He isn’t the only player to have been reduced to tears at the French Open this year, with Qinwen Zheng needing to compose herself several times during an emotional press conference.

“I can’t really explain it right now,” she said. “I haven’t processed it fully. I think it was really difficult. I felt like the conditions were extremely lively and I felt like I wasn’t able to kind of trust my shots in that and didn’t feel like I had control over the ball.

“It was just a really difficult kind of setup for me to step into, I think, having not had many matches. I think probably just a bit light on matches, a bit light on confidence coming into the tournament.”

Her fellow Brit, Francesca Jones, was reduced to tears for a different reason following her impressive comeback victory over Beatriz Haddad Maia on Sunday.