The 2026 French Open crowned first-time champs on both the men’s and women’s sides but was notable in other interesting ways, as well.
(Readers are going to have to give me a little slack this month. With the Hogs’ 2026 road to Omaha roadblocked in Lawrence, sports, for me, has gone into hibernation mode, at least until fall camp starts the first week of August. Oh, to be young and care about MLB and the NBA again.)
In addition to crowning first-time champs on both sides, the second leg of the tennis Grand Slam made other news this year, as reported by Front Office Sports.
Paraguayan Adolfo Daniel Vallejo, the world No. 69, was fined $65,000 for comments made about the umpire following a tough five-set tiebreak in the second round to 17-year-old Frenchman Moise Kouame. Vallejo criticized official Ana Carvalho for not “being strong enough” to handle what became a raucous hometown crowd in support of Kouame.
Vallejo told Clay magazine the match should have been umpired by a man and that it is “very difficult” for a woman to handle such a raucous crowd.
“It has to be refereed by a man because it’s a very demanding crowd, and you need a lot of strength to go against the crowd,” he told the magazine. “It’s not normal for the crowd to be shouting for a full minute without any play.”
He also accused his opponent of stalling (he may have some legit beef there) and shared a since-deleted post on X:
“I never spoke about women in general, I spoke about the referee specifically, who didn’t handle the crowd at any point during the match. That said, I also didn’t say that I lost because of her. I congratulated the opponent and it’s normal for the crowd to cheer for the home player.”
Whether Carvalho deserved criticism for her umpiring is open to debate, but one thing is not — even if she did fail to properly rein in the crowd, it had nothing to do with her gender.
We’re guessing Mr. Vallejo learned at least a couple of valuable lessons here.
We also learned — again, per Front Office Sports — that the French Open is not actually the French Open. Well, it is, but technically, it is named Roland-Garros after the Paris stadium facility at which it is played. The stadium is named for French World War I flying ace Roland Garros.
The event name is hyphenated because that is what French grammar does. Events and places named for people are hyphenated. Therefore, we have Roland Garros, the historical figure, and Roland-Garros, the tennis stadium/tournament.
And here we thought English had quirks.
