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The most anticipated match of the first round of the French Open did not disappoint on Monday, as No. 10 seed Paula Badosa knocked off four-time grand slam champion Naomi Osaka in a tight three-setter, 6-7 6-1 6-4.
This is a severely disappointing result for Osaka, who seemed to be turning a corner on the clay over the last few months. She played some very good tennis in the first set tiebreak to take the opening stanza, but too many unforced errors and some inconsistency in her level overall proved to be her downfall.
After the match, Osaka was very emotional in her press conference following the loss, according to Jon Wertheim of Tennis Channel.
“I mean, I think as time goes on, I feel like I should be doing better. But also, I kind of talked about this before, maybe a couple years ago, or maybe recently, I'm not sure,” Osaka admitted. “I hate disappointing people. So, like, even with Patrick (Mouratoglou), I was thinking this just now, but he goes from working with, like, the greatest player ever to, like, What the f**k this is? You know what I mean?”
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Osaka came into this French Open with a lot of confidence after winning a WTA 125K tournament on the clay and making the round of 16 in the Rome WTA 1000, but all that is for naught now.
Still, the Japanese superstar can take some solace in the fact that she played a very competitive match with a top 10 player in the world in Badosa who made the quarterfinals at last year's U.S. Open and the semifinals at the Australian Open back in January.
Still, that won't be enough to satisfy the hunger for greatness that burns inside Osaka. Before going on maternity leave and having her first child, she was the No. 1-ranked player in the world and had won the U.S. Open and the Australian Open twice each, but she has not been able to get anywhere close to those heights since returning to pro tennis in 2024.
While there have been positive signs for Osaka in terms of the level of tennis she is capable of producing, the consistency hasn't been there. She will now switch over to the grass in an attempt to catch fire before Wimbledon gets underway at the start of July.
