The young Russian sensation of women’s tennis had an atypical day, to say the least, on Sunday during an exhibition tournament played in France. Mirra Andreeva, 57e world, first won the title by forfeit in Bourg-de-Péage because her opponent, the Ukrainian Marta Kostyuk, refused to compete in the final due to the geopolitical context.
But the 16-year-old Russian still took to the field. This is because the organizers of the French event had found someone else for him to face, in order to give his spectators something to sink their teeth into.
· Read also: Who is Mirra Andreeva, the teenager who conquered Wimbledon?
And that someone was a man: a local player who holds an ATP ranking (1146e in singles), Yanis Ghazouani Durand, who was cooking pancakes when the tournament director informed him of the change of program, as he told it to the site tennisactu.net.
“I 100% believed it was a joke!” added in an interview the 23-year-old, who was also a volunteer for the event and who was initially expected to serve as Andreeva’s hitting partner before her final.
Close first round
But it wasn’t a joke (you can also see the match below). The organizers explained on their Facebook page on Sunday: “We have done everything possible to activate our network of professional players, but the deadline is unfortunately too short to find a replacement [à Kostyuk]“, they wrote.
And in this impromptu remake of the battle of the sexes between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs (which at the time had been won by the legendary King), this time it was the young man who had the upper hand over the teenager.
The score was still close, and especially in the first round: 7-5 and 6-2.
“Something crazy”
Because despite their big gap in their respective rankings, all to Andreeva’s advantage, you should know that the difference between the striking force of men and that of women in tennis is significant.
Yanis Ghazouani Durand, who himself took part in the men’s draw, in which he lost in the first round against Frenchman Arthur Rinderknech (96e world), also noted the biggest differences between a man ranked among the 100 best in the world and a woman who appears in the top 100 of the WTA.
“The power and physical qualities are what differ the most,” he analyzed to tennisactu.net. Already, Arthur is taller, his serve goes much faster, everything is faster in the men’s top 100. Everything is more complete, there is a big difference, but it was still hard to win against Andreeva, who played very well.”
“It didn’t go well at first, but I was able to raise my level of play to ultimately win. It was crazy!” added the Frenchman.