PARIS — In all sports, there are advantages to being at home. At the French Open, being a visitor playing against a French player can feel as though the whole world is against you.
The crowds don’t just cheer. They boo, they whistle, they make noise between serves, they hurl insults — and, at least once, even gum — at the opponents of those playing under the French flag. That sort of behavior is why the tennis tournament’s organizers banned alcohol from the stands last year, a policy still in place for the clay-court Grand Slam.
Some of the non-French athletes who deal with that sort of negativity in Paris, such as 19-year-old Jakub Mensík of the Czech Republic, who eliminated Alexandre Müller in front of a rowdy crowd at Court 14 on Tuesday, compare the high-intensity atmosphere to that of a soccer game.
Others choose stronger terms.
“Disgusting. Worst experience of my life,” was what Nicolás Jarry of Chile said this week when asked to think back to last year’s rowdy loss at Court Simonne-Mathieu to France’s Corentin Moutet, whose coach had implored the spectators to make life “hell” for Jarry after the two had a contentious meeting in Santiago earlier in the season.