On a day of grey skies and swirling winds in Paris, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga lit up the gloom with an exhilarating display of power tennis to claim a place in the last eight of the French Open at the expense of Tomas Berdych, the fourth seed, 6-3, 6-2, 6-7 (5-7), 6-3.
In the biggest upset in the men’s draw so far, the Frenchman swept to victory on a tide of local sentiment, Tsonga battering his way to a quarter-final appointment with Kei Nishikori, the world No5.
Almost three hours before he sealed victory with the last of numerous untameable forehands, Tsonga had walked on to Court Philippe Chatrier, where local favourite Alizé Cornet had just been beaten by the Ukrainian Elina Svitolina, to find the crowd in subdued mood. By the end, the Mexican waves were rolling in, the applause and the cries of “Allez!” at deafening levels.
Tsonga being Tsonga, it was not all straightforward. With spitting rain adding to the drama on a day when morning downpours had already forced a late start, the French 14th seed served for the match at 5-4 in the third set, only to punctuate his worst game of the match with a miserable double-fault on break point.
That moment paved the way for a tense tie-break, won by Berdych after he stubbornly clawed back a 3-0 deficit, and the turnaround seemed to energise the powerful Czech, who raced to a 3-1 lead in the fourth set. But Tsonga loves the big occasion and how he rose to it here, battling through a period of uncertainty to record his best showing at a major since he reached the last four at Roland Garros two years ago.
If charisma and joie de vivre alone were enough to win grand slam titles, Tsonga would have a bucketful by now. But the highlight of the Frenchman’s grand slam career remains his breakthrough performance at the 2008 Australian Open, where he lost in the final to Novak Djokovic after claiming the scalps of Andy Murray and Rafael Nadal. Now aged 30, he has never quite lived up to that initial promise, despite semi-final appearances at Wimbledon and in Paris.
For a player of such immense talent, it is a modest return. Could this be the year things finally change for the Frenchman? Tsonga will now face Nishikori, the fifth seed, who made light work of Russia’s Teymuraz Gabashvili over on Court Suzanne Lenglen, winning 6-3, 6-4, 6-2.
Nishikori has been one of the form players on clay this year, winning in Barcelona, reaching the last four in Madrid and extending Djokovic to three sets in Rome. But Tsonga accounted for Roger Federer at the same stage in 2013 and, if he can reproduce the form he showed against Berdych, it is not inconceivable he could set up a Paris rematch with the Swiss maestro.
Beyond that, anything is possible. Few who witnessed it will forget how Yannick Noah, the last Frenchman to lift the Coupe des Mousquetaires, surfed a wave of local emotion to overcome Mats Wilander in the 1983 final. A more recent memory, though, is of the jeers that greeted Tsonga’s tame capitulation to David Ferrer in the semi-finals two years ago. As ever with the Frenchman, the possibilities remain tantalisingly open.
