By Richard Pagliaro | @Tennis_now | Wednesday, 28 May 2025
Photo Credit: Mateo Villalba/Getty
A strange and brave left knee Nuno Borges Roland Garros returned the second round on May Day for Casper Ruud.
World no. 41 Borges twice overthrew the open French finalist Ruud 2-6, 6-4, 6-1, 6-0 to make his sign like the Portuguese man to reach a third round of Roland Garros in the history of the tournament.
Weeks after capturing his ATP Masters 1000 Girls Championship in Madrid, Ruud made his unbearable stories.
Ruud’s earliest exit to Paris has been the earliest exit since his 2018 debut. Ruud without his search for a fourth semifinal Roland Garros to climb a red powder cloud, while the hobby losing 12 of the 13 games.
“Hopefully it’s nothing very serious. For the past two weeks I’ve been fighting a little pain in knee and outside,” Ruud told the media in Paris. “That is why I decided to withdraw from Geneva after Rome, do my best and recover to be ready here.
“When you are practicing, leading to the tournament, it is easier to avoid certain movements that are painful. It is not painful. Everything is not painful. But certain movements there are the kind that make it painful. Some shots are painful to do.
“When you are playing matches, you can’t really control the same way. You do whatever you can to reach any ball. Sometimes you forget that this is a shot for which I don’t have to go in terms of knee pain. That’s almost all.”
Ruud with seventh seed joins the fourth seed Taylor Fritzwho fell into Daniel Altmaier in the first round, and Daniil Medvedevwho served for the match before bending Cameron Norrie In a five -set thriller yesterday, like the third seed of 11 men falling in the first two rounds.
“I really felt it early in the first set,” Ruud told the media in Paris. “I can tell you as one of the most hurt shooting is to do, like, slide on the left foot, an open steady part is what hurts the most, as it is the left knee.
“Very very very, very specific. But when you rotate my leg inside, it also hurts a little to the left. That’s the worst purpose for me and it has been for a few weeks. I have tried not to show the opponents it is.”
Ruud hit the “mouse race” which is the ATP tour with a split stroke saying that wild hours, ranking scores and financial punishment if you miss a mandatory event forces players to compete even when they are injured.
“It is a kind like a mouse race when it comes to ranking, too,” Ruud told the media in Paris. “Of course, if my foot is broken, I will not play. But it is difficult anyway, especially when there is a time with mandatory events to overcome them because the sentences are quite difficult, in terms of everyone else they will play, earn points, and you will not.
“There is also a specified bonus system that has been reduced if you do not appear in mandatory events. It is a controversial system because on the one hand you do not want to appear damaged, and maybe give it another place.
“I’m not sure if you’re aware, but if you don’t play a mandatory event, they cut 25% of your end of the year bonus. You are a forced type of players to appear damaged or ill, or whatever, when that’s not what I think is too right.”
Borges beat Ruud for the first time in three meetings and has now reached the third round in three of the four Slals: Australian Open, Roland Garros and US Open.
Next for Borges is a collision of the third round vs. Alexei Popyrin. Aussie 25th offended Alejandro Tabilo 7-5, 6-3, 6-4.
Ruud said the five-day break he took as Rome was not enough to correct his strange knee.
The former open American finalist left the prospect to bypass the court season with the bar-grass is his less preferred surface-tries to recover. Ruud has not yet exceeded Wimbledon’s second round in five SW19 career appearances
“We’ll see,” replied Ruud when asked if he will close the bar season. “I will go home and do some scans more as soon as possible and will see if there is anything that has changed.
“But between Rome and here, I took them five days completely at home. It was not enough to make the pain leave.
“I wish I could stay here longer. He leaves more time, of course, to recover for future tours.”
