RG '26: Joao Fonseca’s win vs Djokovic changes EVERYTHING (Day 6 Recap)

Roland Garros 2026 continues to descend into pure chaos with Joao Fonseca's historic comeback win vs Novak Djokovic in round three. Fonseca's victory marks the first time in Open Era history that no slam champions have reached the second week at a major. Djokovic's exit leaves a wide-open field with Alexander Zverev emerging as a favorite. But can he handle the pressure? Casper Ruud also claimed a memorable five-set comeback win, defeating Tommy Paul, who continues a worrying trend. Rafael Jodar responds to accusations that he shoved a ball girl, while Daniel Vallejo apologizes for sexist remarks.

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Transcript

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In pro tennis, there's one thing that separates the good players from the greats, and that's Moxie. Friday we learn Joao Fonseca has Moxie while Tommy Paul does not. And that's why the former is still alive in this tournament, while the other will be sent packing to prepare for the grass season. Fonteca made history on day nine of Roland Garros. His 4-6-4-6-637-575 win over Novak Djokovic made him the first team to defeat the Serbian at a major. Novak was formerly 18-0 against this age demographic at the slams. The 19-year-old is also the first player in 16 years since Jurgen Melzer to defeat the GOAT after being down two sets to love. But perhaps most importantly, the win means that we will see a new first-time major champion next Sunday. Of course, I'll break down how Fonteca did the unthinkable and how Paul kind of did the thinkable. I'll also discuss the other results and the drama from Hodar's viral ball girl clip, Vallejo's sexist statement, an apology, plus Zaynum Sonmes' injury. Bonjour Gemma. Actually, actually, let's do it in Portuguese in honor of Fonteca. You know, I'm wearing the Brazilian color, so if y'all didn't notice, so let's let's let's do it in Portuguese. Hola, meon nomie Christian Bast night Christian's Court, where I cover tennis from all angles. I'm sorry to tell my Brazilians if I butchered that. If you've not yet already, make sure you subscribe and click the notification bell so you're notified whenever I post my day seven RG recap. So it looked like I would finally have a day of rest from all the drama going on at Rolling Girls. Novak was kind of moving through pretty comfortably, and then Joel Fonteca said, uh-uh-uh, not so fast. So Novak, he was on fire at the start. He got out to a 5-1, 40 love lead, three set points. Fonte was immediately a little bit sloppy in the earlier stages of this match. He was able to escape that 1-5 game and save those set points. And I think even though he ended up losing the set anyways, this was crucial. And him being able to make the first set more competitive, not only did that allow him to build his confidence, but I think he was able to wear down Novak a little bit more and forcing Novak to work harder to win the set. And you can see Fonseca started to find his range as the match got longer, and he gradually imposed himself against Novak. Still, Djokovic felt in control for the most part in the second set. He got the lone break in set number two thanks to getting some good looks at Fonseca's serve. Fonseca really wasn't able to hit his spots as well in that in that game. He was also able to find the Fonseca backhand. It was able to get a few shorter replies and then redirected up the line a number of times with success. I also think the serve was a key factor in this match. The first serve percentage of Novaks was 85% in the second set. That dropped down to 58% in set number three. And Fonseca took advantage of those extra second serve looks, and he got his first break of the match and his first return game of the third set. And I really think everything shifted once Fonseca got that break. The crowd started getting more involved and he started playing even better. His serve was hit with more accuracy. We saw more serve plus ones. And Fonseca also started to hit his ground strokes with better accuracy, too. He directed more balls to the ad backhand corner of Novak to get the serve stretched out wide there and more vulnerable. And I really do think the crowd helps Fonseca so so much. Sometimes it can work against him, but here the crowd it clearly gets him fired up, and when he's fired up and more energetic in the match, he plays better. And we saw the same thing in his match against Dino Prismich in round two. That two love game in set number three was pivotal. It was the game after Joao got his first break of the match. It was arguably more crucial than the actual break itself because Novak had two breakback points in this two love game. And Fonseca saved them both. I think Novak will be mad at himself for the first missed break point, which was a missed mid-court forehand. But Joao saved the second one with a strong body serve. And here we saw the first signs of Fonseca's clutchness. The second signs were at 5'3 in the third set, where Joao served for it. Djokovic had a break point here at 3040, and Fonseca hit a 118 mile per hour second serve to get the unreturnable from Novak. And here, Djokovic, he even laughed. He even couldn't believe the balls from this kid. And then Fonseca finished off the game with back-to-back aces, a literal foreshadowing for how he would close out the match. Fonseca opened the fourth set with a break of serve after five tries. Novak he had a gain point in this game, but Fonseca's forehand cross-court on the run got the resilient the point. And this forehand on the run, that cross-court forehand, would be a crucial shot for Joel throughout this match. Unlike in the third set though, Novak rustled the break back from Fonseca, and the 39-year-old put himself in prime position to claim the win, holding two breakpoints at 4-3. It was 15-40 at this point. And if he had converted one of those breakpoints, he would have served for the match at 5-3. Fonseca, though, once again showed that Moxie. Even Jim Courier used this exact word in this moment. Because Fonseca erased the first break point, which is bold play, forcing an error from Novak. Then on the second one, he hit a 116 mile per hour second serve, followed by a four-hand winner. This kid has cojones, worth De Carlos Alcaraz. Now, from 4-3-4 set on, this match was absolute cinema. No other rider for an HBO show could script this. Novak, he still played well despite hitting a physical wall and even vomiting on court at one point, or actually multiple points of the match. He saved two break points at four-all, and I thought that he would still close it out in four sets after this, because he came two points from the win the following game, 5-4, to get it to 30 all. And now Novak does almost everything right in this point. He gets Fonseca pulled a bit wide on the backhand. But what does Joao do? Hits a screaming down the line backhand winner. The guy is utterly insane. Now Novak gets it back to deuce and he hits a quality return in this deuce point, and Joao's only left to do a weak pickup on the forehand. But again, the cojones from Fonteca. He comes forward off this relatively weaker forehand and baits Djokovic into hitting a backhand error. Ridiculous. Now Joao he saved a Djokovic game point the following game at five all to ultimately break, and then he held to send us into a decider. And I think his deeper return positioning on his first serve return helped a lot, as did his backhand down the line. And even when Joe when Joao didn't hit a screaming backhand down the line winner, it set himself up for the forehand kill shot. Now in the fifth set, we saw even more drop shots from Joao, which was a smart play because again, Novak was vomiting and he's 39 years old. He's not a spring chicken. Plus, with Joao consistently pushing Novak deep behind the baseline with pace, it's just a good changeup shot because Novak was so far out of position. Djokovic again, he was still playing great tennis and he got out to an early break lead in the fifth set. He was up 3-1. Now, in this 3-1 game, he played a pretty poor service game, giving Fonseca the break right back. I think Novak was definitely pushing himself to his physical limit at this point and let up here. And Novak for sure struggled with his energy levels. It was similar to what we saw a little bit at the Australian Open Finals against Alcadas. He missed returns that he would normally make in his sleep, but you still have to credit Joao. He was not letting up, he kept bullying Djokovic around the court with those forehands, and also that pinpoint accurate serving of his helped a lot too. In the five-all game, Novak he tried to finish points a bit earlier, and we saw the drop shot from him. But Fonseca somehow started moving the best that we've ever seen him move. And I don't know if it was maybe pure adrenaline from him at this point, but I'm just wondering how was he able to do this five hours in, again, not just 19 years old. And by the way, Joao also used the drop shots a few times, but he was more successful and he and that helped him get the decisive break. Now, when he was serving for the match at 6'5, he was obviously serving for the biggest win of his life, trying to beat the GOAT and trying to get to his first slam round of 16. And understandably, we saw some nerves from the 19-year-old. He hit some shaky forehand airs and went down the break point. And here I thought we would be treated to an edgy, deciding 10-point tie break. But then Fonseca does the unthinkable, hitting three perfectly placed aces in a row to get the biggest win of his life. I'm still stunned, just even thinking about it. Who does that? I know Joel talked about John Isner, but John Isner couldn't do that mess. Only the Queen can, Serena. But this will go down as one of the defining matches of the century by far. A lot of people drew parallels from Wimbledon 2001, where Feder beat Sampris, the then goat, 7-5 in the fifth set. But this match was so iconic, I might just go out and buy an on shirt, buy that same on shirt that Fonseca was wearing. And y'all know I'm not even the biggest fan of on, so that says something. This might be top three match of the year for me. I think still both Australian Open Semifinals eclipses this a little bit, but we'll see how I feel when the end of the year comes. But this match was just so fun to watch. And you could tell both guys actually enjoyed themselves too, even Novak. And I even got my life re-watching it for the second time. And I love that HBO has the rights to roll and girls because if I'm bored and then want to feel something, I don't need to watch reruns of Succession or Industry. I have this right here at my disposal. It fits right in with HBO's catalog. But Fonseca, he's arrived, he's fully arrived, and he's proved a lot of doubters wrong. A lot of people were really just god-awful to Fonseca, especially with the rises of Hodar as well as Tien having more success than Joao recently. But he proved, and even Novak said himself in the press conference, that all the hype is deserved. And him being able to pull off this performance to reach your maiden slam round of 16 and first top five win, mind you, back-to-back wins from two sets to love down, you're on a different level. And again, Novak was 301 and one in best of five set matches whenever he had a two sets lead before this match. So you gotta put some respect on this young man's name. Now on the topic of Djokovic, I know this brings more questions of if it's time for him to hang it up. He said this could be his last Roland Garrett. I'm honestly not moved. He said that match against center last year could have been his last. He's playing until 2028. And initially I thought that that was crazy him playing it that long, but I can see it for sure. I do think though that Clay, best of five, is a different animal. So even if he does intend to play till 2028, you never know. He might not be physically fit enough for something like this. But regardless, he played a phenomenal match: 70 winners, 39 unforced heirs. He won three more points than Joao. So it's really phenomenal that at 39 years old, he's out here doing this. Like testing guys 20 years his his junior. No one, again, even though he lost this match, this further solidifies that he's the GOAT. I don't know if anyone else can do this at that age, for sure. He will be definitely gutted with this being a missed chance. Of course, both Yannick and Carlos are not in this tournament. So he he's gonna be disappointed for sure. I still think it would have been an uphill battle with this being again best of five on Clay. And on the bright side, at Wimbledon, it'll be better for him. The conditions play obviously quicker, point shorter. He also won't have to deal with Alcadas there, but still, center will probably be back in full force. But back to talking about Fonseca, he for sure sold me 100% with this win. I think he will win a major at some point in his career. People may they might say it's a fluke, but the nerve he showed in this match is the nerve only seen in champions. Will that major that I have him winning come this tournament at Roland Garrett's? I don't know. But up next for Joao in round four is Caspar Rood, who also pulled off a four and a half plus hour comeback win from two sets to love down. He defeated Tommy Paul 4-6-6-7-647675. Now I'm not even gonna cap. I didn't watch a majority of this match or any other match for that matter. I was just too focused on Fonseca Djokovic. I don't know how anyone else can watch multiple matches at the same time. Maybe I do have ADHD, I don't know, but I can't do it. I'm gonna have to go back and watch a lot of these matches when the tournament ends and talk about them more from my members-only tournament wrap-up. But, anyways, from what I did watch, I was very pleased. This match was very entertaining. And Tommy played well. He frequently served in volley with good success. He was hitting his forehand well, and he really should have won the match. Rude, he did play well to force the fifth set. He got more aggressive on all fronts, but still, Paul had two match points at 5-4 in the fourth set. I'm not too mad at him for those mismatch point opportunities. Casper, he was pretty clutch. He served his way out of trouble, and it was a similar story when Paul had two break points at 2-1 in the fourth set. Now, the fifth set though, it was a different story. It was a whole other level of choke from Paul. Do you want to give credit to Tommy for recovering from being three love down in this deciding set? And he had two break opportunities to serve for the match when it was five all. These missed opportunities were not like at 5-4 in the fourth set where Casper was just clutch. Paul had a play on the first break point, but he netted an inside in forehand. And then on the second one, he had a second serve look, but he mishit the forehand return and ultimately lost the game. That's not even the worst part because the following game at 5-6, Paul was up 40 love. He had three game points to bring it to a deciding tie break, but he ended up losing five points in a row and lost the match. Once again, the forehand and poor court positioning cost him here. And Rude, he now improves to 4-0 against Paul and Majors. And on that topic, Tommy is now 2-12 against top 20 players in slams. This was his big chance. He could have won this entire tournament, but once again, he shows that he lacks the edge and Moxie. And this is not the first time, of course, that Tommy has lost a big match despite being in a decent position. I'm thinking back to the Australian Open quarterfinals against Alexander Zverev. Even though he lost in four sets, he could have won and in three or four sets. Then even though he lost in straight sets against Carlos, he could have at least won a set. And then that infamous Miami Open quarterfinal against Arthur Fees, he had four match points, didn't convert. And now here we are here. And in this match, Paul was two for 14 on breakpoints. Meanwhile, Casper, three for three. And it's a true shame because I've never really seen a guy at this level be so hurt by an inability to win big matches. And his locker room reputation is not gonna be great. And losses like this only make it worse for him whenever he has opportunities in the future similar. So I don't know. I hope he can get over this hump. He's not a spring chicken, he's 28 years old, but he still has time. But I think this will go down as probably one of his biggest missed opportunities. And there have been quite a few now with Tommy. To correct myself, Tommy just turned 29, so the clock's ticking even faster for your brother. But Joao Fonseca was not the only 19-year-old to secure his maiden slam second week appearance with a five-set win as Rafa Hodar defeated American Alex Mickelson 7-6-6746-6363. Now, more people were focused on Hodar's mid-matched behavior as opposed to his milestone. And there was one moment in particular when Hodar went off court. He appeared to look like he shoved a ball girl to some. And to me, it looked like that on first glance. I was taken aback. I was like, whoa. But then people slowed down the clip, and it does look like he was gesturing with his hand and that the ball girl might have tripped on a bit on the tarp. But Hodar, he denied touching this ball girl in his press conference. And I'll choose to believe him, but regardless, he needs to tighten up his act. I understand emotions run high, but he can be a bit nicer to the volunteers and the ball people and the towel people. It's no need to act that snappy. From previous reports, he has a reputation of having a little bit of a temper dating back to his junior in college days, and the comments are not on his side. People are dragging him still. And it's funny just how quickly sentiments can change because before, especially in Madrid, people were in love with Rafa and felt that he wasn't getting his just due and they were bashing Fonseca in the process. Now Fonseca's getting the hype and praise, and Hodar is getting ished on. So life works in mysterious ways. But the field right now on the men's side feels wide open, and it's the first time in the open era where no men's slam champs have reached the fourth round. This is wild, and it's the most sad I've ever been for an ATP slam. And this is why I love the WTA so much because we see things like this, or at least we used to, all the time. Thinking back to 2021 Roland Garros. But I'm glad that we're getting a little bit of that mess on the ATP because I definitely prefer the drama. The narrative is just so juicy right now because Zverev, he's gonna be the clear title favorite, and he should be a shoe-in, at least for the final. He'll next take on Lucky Loser, Jesper DeJang, who defeated Karen Hatchinoff in five sets. Then he would face a Spaniard in the quarterfinals in either Rafa Hodar or Pablo Kranya Busta. And the stronger of those two players, Hodar, is inexperienced and has never reached a slam second week before and could also feel it physically later on in this tournament. And then you have Rude and Fonseca, they've each already played two five-set matches. Menjik, he did a great job to get that win over Di Minor, but he could run out of steam, especially after that Marathon Navone win in round two. Then Rublev is Rublev. No shade, but Andre, he has never made a slam semifinal in a lot of previous attempts. Again, I think Zverev should at least reach the finals, but we'll see. Anything can happen. Now, Tana talk a little bit about the drama that's been going on, aside from the actual results. Earlier in the tournament, 20-year-old Belgian Alexander Bloch was forced to pull out from the tournament after tweaking his ankle on the tarps during one of his practice sessions. And then on Friday, Turkey Zanop Sonemez was a victim of a Lacoste advertising block. At two love during her doubles match alongside Tatiana Maria, Sonomez, while running back for a backhand, tripped on the small Lacoste branded block and she collapsed into the back fence. Xenop was seen on court by medical professionals and was soon after forced to retire. And the irony is that Katie Bolter tripped on a block the day prior in one of her matches. And she didn't get injured, but she tweeted that the blocks need to go. And then hours after that tweet, Son Miz gets hurt. It's crazy. And Zaynup also made a tweet calling for the blocks to be removed. And I agree, there's really no need for them to be that close to the tournament. I know the US Open also has blocks, but we don't really see that issue at Author Ash. But that's also because there's more space behind the courts at the US Open on all the courts in general compared to Roland Garros. Now, the other drama-related thing to talk about is Daniel Vallejo. He made some controversial comments about Chair Empire and a Carvajal following his second round loss to Mois Kwame. The French fans on Suzanne Longland, they were a lot, and they were even cheering Vallejo's missed first serves on numerous instances. And while speaking with Clay Magazine, Vallejo said that the match should be refereed by a man because, quote, it's a very demanding crowd and you need a lot of strength to go against them. And Daniel received a lot of backlash. He tried to clean it up on Twitter and said that it was taken out of context, but Clay Magazine came with receipts. Then Roland Garrett came out with a statement saying that they strongly condemn all sexist comments and will issue a fine against Vallejo. Daniel made an IG story post apologizing, saying that his comments were a bit misinterpreted and that he didn't blame his loss on the umpires official officiating. Now, some people highlighted the irony of Roland Garros taking this stand against sexism when they've engaged in rather sexist practices themselves with their scheduling of women's matches, but alas. And on the topic of women's matches, I'm gonna do a quick women's roundup. Again, everything went according to plan for the most part, so I'm not gonna spend a whole lot of time. We did get one rather surprising result, and that's Joe Tacman eliminating the number 10 seed Carolina Mujova in straight sets. Tacman now takes on Mira Andreva, who will seek her third straight quarterfinal at Roland Girls. Serrano Christella won her match against Solana Sierra, which isn't a surprising result in itself, but the way in which she won the match was jarring because she dished out a double bagel to Sierra to become the oldest woman to win a slam match with the double bagel. Christella will be a pretty big favorite to reach the round of 16 when she takes on Shi Yu Wong, who beat Startup Savo, who beat Rabakina. We will be treated to a couple of edgy fourth round matchups. First, we'll get a battle of the mothers between Alina Sfitsalina and Belinda Bencic. Fitzelina leads the head to head four to two, but Bencic actually won their lone clay meeting back in 2014, although it was Charleston Green Clay. I'm gonna have Fitzelina win this match in two sets. And then Iga's Fiance takes on a Marta Kostiak. Iga leads the head to head three to nothing and has never dropped a set to Marta, but this is a new Kostiak. She's now a 1000-level champion and is undefeated on clay this year. So it's gonna be a big test for Iga, but I think that she'll pass it. I have her winning this one in three sets. That is all I have for this video. Let me know your thoughts on everything, all the continued drama. And let me know in the comments first who you think will make the Rolling Girls final on the bottom half. Will Zverev do it or will someone else stop him? Also, let me know if you think that whole dog. Did indeed push the ball, girl, or if you believe Rafa, and will Tommy Paul ever find his Moxie? I don't know. Again, make sure you subscribe and click that notification bell so you're notified whenever I post my day seven recap. Thank you all so, so much for watching and for your support. It really keeps me pushing whenever I'm so sleep deprived. But I'll see y'all next time here on Christian's Court.