There will come a day when Jack Draper vs Joao Fonseca blossoms into a fine rivalry. But not this day. For now, it is man against boy.
The 23-year-old from London dispatched the 18-year-old from Rio de Janeiro 6-2, 6-4, 6-2 to reach the second week of the French Open for the first time.
‘Joao has caught the intention of everyone, there’s so much more to come from him,’ said No 5 seed Draper. ‘Just a bit of experience from me today. But he’s got a really bright future right at the top of the game.’
Draper had never won a match here before this fortnight, but his stated ambitions are far greater than breaking his duck and he is matching deed with word.
In the last 16 he will be a heavy favourite, whoever wins the clash of outsiders between Alexander Bublik and Henrique Rocha. A likely quarter-final against the mighty Jannik Sinner awaits thereafter.
But his focus over the last two days was squarely on Fonseca, a teenager whom everyone has pegged as a future Grand Slam champion.
Jack Draper beat Joao Fonseca to reach the last-16 of the French Open at Roland Garros
Draper dispatched the 18-year-old 6-2, 6-4, 6-2 and delivered a dominant display
Fonseca has been pegged as a future Grand Slam champion and plays with youthful verve
Draper’s chances received a boost at 8.52pm on Friday night, with the news that French No 1 Arthur Fils was withdrawing with a stress fracture of the back. That triggered a chain reaction in the schedule which saw Draper v Fonseca bumped up from Court Simone Mathieu to Suzanne Lenglen.
The result was a totally different atmosphere. Mathieu is only partially ticketed, so the unreserved upper tiers would have been swarming with Brazilians. Over on Lenglen, there were only a few brushstrokes of green and gold. It was not even a full house. It was hot and humid – too muggy to be chanting and hollering.
Draper will have been urging himself to strike early and take the sting out of the match. There was very little sting to begin with and what venom there was he quickly extracted.
As Draper secured an early break, there was a shot from Fonseca which summed up where his game is currently at.
Draper whipped a solid forehand, deep and with plenty of spin. On clay, it called for Fonseca to retreat a few feet, allow the ball to drop and rebuild the rally. Instead he stepped in, took it on the half-volley and ripped it into the middle of the net.
Tennis, especially on the dirt, is about knowing when to push and when to absorb; it is about respecting your opponent’s shots. Fonseca plays with the disrespect of youth and that makes him thrilling to watch. It also for now, at least for the top guys, makes him rather easy to beat.
And Draper is every inch a top guy these days. He dominated Fonseca in every facet of the game. Instead of avoiding the dangerous Fonseca forehand, he attacked it.
The Brazilian loves to trade in the backhand corner, before stepping round and unleashing the forehand hammer. By proactively going into the forehand wing, Draper was hitting into space, and forcing Fonseca to defend on a side where he prefers to attack.
Draper was better than his opponent in every facet of the game and attacked the forehand
Fonseca’s game is so impressive, just unrefined, and he will surely sit at the top table one day
It is startling how quickly Draper has tapped into the cadences of this most unfamiliar surface
In his second-round win over Gael Monfils, Draper struggled at times with the cool, slow night time conditions. In the 28 degree afternoon heat, his forehand and serve had far more zip.
The drop shot was also tremendously, at times laughably, effective – Fonseca just couldn’t get a read on it, often so bamboozled he stood stock still as the ball plopped over.
And those two weapons were often deployed in tandem: heavy forehand down the line to push Fonseca back; wrong-footing drop shot to that same side.
Clay-court mastery of which Rafael Nadal would have been proud; it is startling how quickly Draper has tapped into the cadences of this most unfamiliar surface.
He displayed a tactical sophistication of which Fonseca is not yet capable. For now, the young man’s results remain far short of the hype.
There were so many flashes of cameraphones from the crowd that Draper asked the umpire to ask them to stop.
And that speaks to the fact that, as much as people flock to Fonseca’s matches to watch him, they come almost more to have watched him; to be able to say, when he lifts a 10th Grand Slam title, ‘I was there when he lost to Draper on Lenglen.’
If that sounds like a lot on a teenager’s shoulder’s, that’s because it is, but Fonseca seems to be dealing with things remarkably well at the moment. His game is so impressive, just unrefined. He will surely sit at the top table one day.
Draper has not taken his seat there yet either – but he is pulling up a chair and perusing the starters.
