Remember the early rounds of this year’s French Open when Ons Jabeur raised eyebrows over the lopsided match scheduling for WTA players? The controversy deepened when Coco Gauff and Madison Keys echoed similar concerns, spotlighting the tournament’s decision to exclude women’s matches from the coveted night sessions, again in 2025, just as they did in 2024. Now, as the women’s SF loom and Aryna Sabalenka storms past the quarterfinals, setting up a blockbuster clash against Iga Swiatek, the top seed didn’t hold back. Adding fuel to the fire, the Tigress has now roared with the same demand for fairness, reigniting the conversation around gender equity at Roland Garros. Wondering what she said?

Speaking at her post-match press conference following a solid win over 8th seed Qinwen Zheng, 7-6(3), 6-3, the top seed touched on more than just her performance. The Belarusian ace shared her thoughts on the sparse crowd turnout for what was arguably a marquee match. “I didn’t really look in the in the crowd, but it felt like it was a lot of people, and I agree it was a big match. It probably would make more sense to put us a little bit later, just so more people could watch it,” she reflected.

Sabalenka also acknowledged the silver lining of playing earlier in the day. “But at the same time, I’m happy to finish earlier, and then I have a half day off, and you know I can just enjoy the city and do all the things that I have to do. But yea,h talking about that, I definitely think that would make more sense to kind of like move our match for a little bit later,” she added.

However, the top seed didn’t hold back when expressing her views on fairness in match scheduling later. “I definitely have to say that yeah, we deserve the equal treatment, and there were a lot of like great battles, a lot of great matches, which would be cool to see as like a night session, just so like more people in the stands watching like these incredible battles. And just to show ourselves to more people. So yeah, I definitely agree that. We deserve to be put on a bigger stage, you know, like better timing, more people watching,” she concluded.

To remind you all, just a few days earlier, Coco Gauff had voiced similar frustrations following her 2nd-round win over Tereza Valentova, 6-2, 6-4. “I talked about this a few days ago, and to be honest, I didn’t really have all the facts about the situation,” Coco Gauff admitted. “I do think that women’s matches are worthy of a night spot.”

Fellow American and AO champion Madison Keys also chimed in after defeating Sofia Kenin in the 3rd round. “I think women typically have night matches everywhere else, so I don’t think it’s a point of discussion at other tournaments,” Keys pointed out. “It’s obviously been a hot topic here. Seeing as there’s only one match, I think that it’s much different than other tournaments, but I think women’s matches are very entertaining and they have great value and they deserve to be the feature match.”

While all fingers seem to be pointing at tournament director Amélie Mauresmo, is she truly to blame? Or is the issue part of a larger systemic oversight that continues to sideline women’s tennis from the spotlight it rightfully deserves?

Ex-American Ace backs Amélie Mauresmo over night scheduling backlash

Former American tennis pro Chanda Rubin recently shared her candid take on the Roland Garros’ night session scheduling controversy during the “Tennis Channel Live” Podcast. Addressing the underrepresentation of women’s matches in the prime-time slot at Parisian clay, Rubin added, “I think when they conceived of this night session, which is really just one match, and with the start time of it, when they conceived of it, they knew that they didn’t really care about having the women play in this spot, in this slot, because of the time,”

Rubin further noted the problematic optics of Mauresmo, as tournament director, serving as the public spokesperson on this matter. “And unfortunately for me, they’ve got Amelie Mauresmo going out as the face of this decision when it was made before she even became tournament director,” she said. “And yes, putting a woman there to explain it makes it go, I guess, across a lot easier than if you had a man in that position explaining that decision. But I just think it’s just poorly done all the way around and hopefully we can find a solution to not have the optics look as bad as they do.”

Statistics support Rubin’s argument, though. Since Amélie Mauresmo took over as tournament director in 2022, only 2 women’s matches have been scheduled for the night session on Court Philippe-Chatrier. In both 2024 and 2025, all night matches so far have exclusively featured ATP matches. The last women’s night session was in the 2023 4th round, when Aryna Sabalenka faced Sloane Stephens.

And now, with voices like Coco Gauff, Madison Keys, and Aryna Sabalenka echoing these concerns, the spotlight is firmly on the tournament. What’s your take on this ongoing disparity?