ROLAND GARROS

June 2, 2026

Ivan Ljubicic

Press Conference

(In French.)

THE MODERATOR: Good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for being here with Ivan who is the head of high-level tennis players at the FFT.

Could you please share with us a few general thoughts for this season for our French players.

IVAN LJUBICIC: So my general observation and analysis is rather simple, actually. Two top seeds with our male players and none with our female players, so the results are the consequences of today's level.

So Diane's performance and Moise's performance is very positive. As for the rest, it reflects today's situation, neither positive nor negative.

That's the way things are today, and we need to accept it and keep on moving forward and hope that the tide will turn eventually. A country such as France does not deserve this, but that's our reality, so we need to work hard to change things around. That's my general observation, before I answer your questions.

In my current position and role, I'm not exactly worried about the future of French tennis. The next generation is here, as you have gotten to know them, and I think we're in a good position to have better hopes and dreams for the future, so that with the next gen, we will be able to clock up much more positive results, particularly for men.

For women, we're not in such a great position, but we will keep on working. You can rest assured of this. We will keep on making sure that we can do as best as we can.

THE MODERATOR: Questions.

Q. Question on Moise Kouame. He was this tournament's sensation. Some of us discovered him, and quite quickly, we saw that he was absolutely remarkable. So are you counting on him for the years to come in order for French tennis to perform better?

IVAN LJUBICIC: Moise has shown time and again that there are clear signs with regards to him, and here I'm not just referring to the results. I'm also referring to the way that he experiences matches. The way that he goes through the matches is always very interesting. He is ready to do very important things in the future.

I know Moise really well, but he keeps on surprising me. Following the first round, he even said that he was perhaps even ready to win the tournament.

In France, when you say these things, sometimes people might tend to think that you're boasting a little too much, but actually, why not? You really want to rise up to the challenge, and you never know what might happen.

He has absolutely no limits. As far as he's concerned, the sky is the limit. That might mean for some people that he's not humble enough, but I was very happy to see the way that he lived through these matches, and there are great signs. We can never know what will happen, but there are interesting signs.

Let's not rush, though. He's 17. He's ranked 200-something worldwide, so we need to work along with his staff. We're here to support them, as we always say.

I'm sure you understand this. But the audience, the public at large, does not understand this so much. The Federation has a role to play here, and we can only hope that he will keep on making progress.

In my opinion, I think he needs to play as many matches as possible, to experience both the positive and the negative. You need both.

We'll see how fast he goes. He'll make progress, for sure. But it still remains to be seen how fast he will go. He'll probably be in the top 100 soon enough. We have no stress.

When I took on my role at the end of 2023, I thought that you need pretty much 8 to 10 years after your training to actually have concrete results, so I thought by 2030, we should be there. And yet, we are in 2026. Perhaps a little too early, but still, I'm very happy. There are a number of kids that I worked with in 2015, 2016, 2017. Prizmic, Marta Kostyuk, for example, and it's been 10 years.

Now they're showing their true colors, particularly Marta. She's actually playing right now on court. I always thought that she was a girl, and now a woman, who can do great things.

But you should not rush through things. There is a process that needs to be gone through. And also in terms of maturity, that's really important. That takes time.

I'm really happy to see that Moise is already standing out. There is a clear project, but we have Matisse Martin who is playing right now. The generation of 2009 boys is already on the rise.

I can already feel the pressure to make sure that that generation can keep moving forward and upward. Not in the next year, but in the next few years so that they can play top-level tennis worldwide.

Q. On another topic, are you worried about Arthur Fils and his back injury?

IVAN LJUBICIC: I do not have much information. Of course, I'm concerned. But as far as I know, following Rome, things were not looking so severe, but in the end, he wasn't even able to play here. So I did not try to reach out too much. I wanted him to be able to get some good rest.

Perhaps we forgot about him a little too quickly this year, but he's a great player, and he's done great lately. He's part of the top players in the world. It really is a pity that this year he was not able to participate and at least try to play in this year's tournament. So of course we should be concerned.

They decided not to participate in Roland Garros. Why was that? Was that to make sure that he'd be ready for the grass season?

I would imagine that we'll know very shortly. But it is a pity. Nothing to add here. It is difficult.

With regards to Diane, I'm very happy about her results. She really deserves it. She's been so invested. It has not been simple for her. And now that investment is starting to pay off here in the French Open, and so it's great.

Her staff and structure is top level today, so I can only be happy that she was able to experience all of these great moments here. Fourth round here, I'm hoping that this is the start of something that she truly deserves with her talent and the level she has shown.

Q. I don't want to ask you a tricky question, but what about the wildcard for the US Open? That's going to be a challenge.

IVAN LJUBICIC: Yes. We could even find ourselves in an unexpected situation whereby certain guys, since you were referring to men, I would believe, so there might be men with 110 ranking and playing in the finals in Montreal.

Then what do you do about that? Actually, someone asked me this question yesterday, someone from the staff of certain players. They have already started to ask these things. Honestly, it was the first time that I started to think about it, but it really is difficult. It's complicated.

We'll just have to wait and see. I asked Gael to please ask directly for the US Open. That's the way things are, I know. But it's not up to me to decide, right? I'm not on my own here.

So as we always do, this will be a collective decision. We'll make sure to discuss the matter. Quite honestly, I'm quite happy to have these kinds of problems, right? Because it means that we have players that are good enough to get a wildcard.

How long do we have before the US Open? Six weeks, I believe, after Wimbledon, so maybe a week after Wimbledon, tops.

So by then, hopefully Gael will be playing and winning some matches. In the French Open this year, Wawrinka entered at the very last minute, and then there was an extra wildcard, so hopefully we'll have a little more flexibility.

Q. On Ksenia Efremova, what's your opinion? She had a wildcard. She lost in the first round. And in the juniors, we thought that she'd be shooting up like a star, and didn't really happen.

IVAN LJUBICIC: Well, actually, I think it's only natural. She's 17 years old, she's playing in the main draw for a Grand Slam, then just ten days after, she was top-seed No. 1, with all of the pressure in the world on her shoulders.

Women's tennis, particularly for girls, it's really hard to handle that kind of pressure, because you know when it comes to their serve, when it comes to their shots, they cannot necessarily overpower their opponent.

But I was happy with her behavior, with the way that she experienced it all, because it's really challenging. I saw her after the match. She was so disappointed. These are turning points in one's career, the kinds of experiences that will allow you to learn so much.

I saw Ksenia yesterday, and I said asked her, do not compare yourself to anyone. Do not compare yourself to Moise Kouame or Sharapova, no one. You'll have a journey of your own. We do not know yet what your journey will look like, so take it day by day. Give it your all, 100%. We'll try to support her as best as we can in the positive and negative moments of her journey.

In Australia, as well, she was having a challenging time. In the first round, she was not able to find solutions. That's okay. It's just a match amongst many others. It's not that her potential is any different because she loses or wins a match. Her career ahead of her is very long.

Q. What about Lois Boisson? It seems she is dropping away. Has she been asking for any help?

IVAN LJUBICIC: Yes, we have helped her. I'm not going to enter into too much detail here, but I can only hope that she plays tennis. And even as she was losing, I saw that in terms of her shots, she was excellent. She had a remarkable play, and hopefully she finds her pace.

She needs to play matches. She did not play for too long, so she just needs to feel differently on the court.

Obviously, the season was very different from her tournament last year, but I'm sure she'll be back in the top 100 very quickly.

My only hope is that she can still remain in good shape so that she can play the right level of tennis, but I'm not exactly worried here, because she plays really well when it comes to her movements on the court. When it comes to her shots, she does really well. But she needs to find the right place for her on the court.

Q. What about the Italians? Three of them in the quarters here in the French Open, and they did really well in the US Open, as well. Is there an inspiration we can draw from them?

IVAN LJUBICIC: It's not just about Sinner. They have many top players that can play really well, but we need to look into what they did exactly to get to the point that they reached.

I know the Italian environment quite well. They all have their own journey. Sinner was trained by Piatti, Berrettini by Santopadre, Arnaldi in Sanremo.

So they all had their specific training, right? The Federation did a number of things that perhaps were positive, but they were not necessarily directly involved in these players' individual projects.

So we're looking into this at the Federation. We are trying to understand how things are going on their end so that perhaps we can inspire ourselves.

But of this I'm convinced: Solid projects are always individual projects. We're not going to be 110% responsible for any player's project. You need the player to be involved, the parents, the coach, and then we can help. But it really is a collective success.

Cobolli trains with his father and has trained with his father since the start. He had had support from the Federation, but not so much. So each of these players in Italy did their thing.

In France, it's a little different. The culture is different. There are certain things that we can probably learn from them. We'll probably add more 15,000 and 25,000 tournaments next year to help our French players so they do not have to go abroad to play.

But it's a little more simple when you have a role model such as Sinner, right? Sinner has really made it possible for other players to be motivated to make progress.

That might be the case for Moise, but not necessarily. But the 2009 generation right now are most definitely looking up to Moise and they think that they can do the same. That's really important. You need these role models, particularly for women tennis.