{"id":695395,"date":"2026-05-26T09:35:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T09:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/695395\/"},"modified":"2026-05-26T09:35:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T09:35:08","slug":"olympic-champion-zheng-qinwen-breaks-down-in-tears-after-french-open-defeat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/695395\/","title":{"rendered":"Olympic champion Zheng Qinwen breaks down in tears after French Open defeat"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Athletic\u00a0has live coverage of Day 3 of the 2026 French Open<\/a><\/p>\n

PARIS \u2014 Zheng Qinwen<\/a>, who won Olympic gold at Roland Garros two years ago, broke down in tears during an emotional news conference after going out of the French Open<\/a> in the first round.<\/p>\n

Zheng, a quarterfinalist last year, produced an error-strewn performance in the face of a masterclass in variation from Poland\u2019s world No. 114, Maja Chwali\u0144ska, who completed a 6-4, 6-0 win. Zheng also received lengthy treatment for a foot blister down 3-0 in the second set in what were sweltering conditions on an exposed Court 7.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s another tough setback for a player who has been plagued by injury since becoming Olympic champion at the 2024 Paris Games. An ongoing right elbow injury required surgery in July and restricted her to 32 matches last year. Zheng returned in February after five months out, but has won just seven matches in 2026, only able to produce her best tennis in patches. She will fall out of the world\u2019s top 100 after this defeat, from her current ranking of No. 56, leaving her in the previously unimaginable position of having to qualify for the biggest events.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe nerves and the pressure today didn\u2019t allow me to play the tennis that I want,\u201d Zheng said in her post-match news conference. She added that losing in the first round of the French Open was \u201creally, really tough for me. It takes time to handle it.\u201d<\/p>\n

The tears then started to flow, as Zheng took deep breaths and explained that the foot issue was to reapply tape to a foot blister that had been bothering her. She said, \u201cwell, of course, it\u2019s hard for me to take that I lost the match, but\u2026\u201d before trailing off when asked if the injury or the loss was causing more upset. After recovering, Zheng said that her opponent\u2019s heavy topspin combined with the tight conditions had left her powerless to change the momentum of the match.<\/p>\n

While on court, Zheng said that there wasn\u2019t enough space on the small outside court for her to move backwards when attempting to deal with Chwali\u0144ska\u2019s high-bouncing topspin groundstrokes. In the interview room, she referenced an occasion when she collided with a line judge.<\/p>\n

Zheng played with so little margin Monday that when things started to go wrong, they went very wrong. She produced 23 unforced errors in 16 games, which amounted to 25 percent of the points played in the match, and a double fault to finish was a fittingly sorry ending. Chwali\u0144ska readily exploited her opponent\u2019s seemingly inhibited movement and lack of control with heavy forehands that Zheng simply couldn\u2019t get a handle on.<\/p>\n

At 23, Zheng has plenty of time left to get her career back on track, but such a drop in the rankings is rough news for her and the tour in general. She is a magnetic personality with a huge following, and has shown with her Olympic title, and her run to the 2024 Australian Open final, that she can deliver on the biggest stages. The Paris success two years ago included Zheng inflicting Iga \u015awi\u0105tek\u2019s first defeat at Roland Garros in 26 matches.<\/p>\n

Now she\u2019ll have to reckon with playing second-tier events, in order to qualify for the Grand Slams and WTA 1000s, the next rung down. Zheng said having to almost start again could be \u201ckind of a positive,\u201d because it would allow her to play more matches. \u201cI think the problem was I needed more matches to get into the rhythm,\u201d Zheng said of her performance against Chwali\u0144ska Monday.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

She also confirmed that her coach, Pere Riba, was involved in a car accident about 10 days ago and suffered neck and back injuries. He could be seen in the stands wearing a neck brace.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course it takes a while to recover. It\u2019s not an easy moment for us. It\u2019s a difficult moment,\u201d Zheng said.<\/p>\n

Chwali\u0144ska meanwhile kept her composure on the other side of the net to win only her second ever Grand Slam main-draw match. She\u2019ll next face No. 23 seed Elise Mertens or Tatjana Maria in the second round.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Athletic\u00a0has live coverage of Day 3 of the 2026 French Open PARIS \u2014 Zheng Qinwen, who won…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":695396,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[565],"tags":[64,63,85,747],"class_list":["post-695395","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tennis","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-sports","tag-tennis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=695395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/695395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/695396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=695395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=695395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=695395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}