Amélie Mauresmo never enjoyed Roland Garros as much as her talent deserved. From the day she drew inspiration from Yannick Noah’s win in 1983, as a young girl watching from her home in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, just north of Paris, and all through her serial disappointments in front of her home crowd over 15 years, the French Open represented a prize too far.
She got as far as the quarter-finals twice but prospered elsewhere, notably at Wimbledon and in Melbourne, and was No1 in the world for five weeks. Andy Murray, her most enduring client, has two semi-finals to show for eight visits to Paris and, on a roll of 10 clay wins and his first two titles on the dirt this summer, he has never been better placed to go further.