Roger Federer was honest with himself, and everyone else, before the French Open, saying he knew he didn’t have any chance of winning the title. He arrived in Paris, after all, having played just three matches over the preceding year-plus following two knee operations.
Still, neither he, nor anyone else, probably expected Federer to have such a hard time getting out of Week 1 at Roland Garros. Eventually, he avoided what would have been his earliest loss there since 2004 by pulling out a 7-6 (5), 6-7 (3), 7-6 (4), 7-5 victory over 59th-ranked Dominik Koepfer that began Saturday night and ended as 1 a.m. approached — with no crowd present because of a COVID-19 curfew.
