Gasquet announces retirement after Roland-Garros 2025
In an interview with L’Equipe, the French player announced his decision to stop competing after the Parisian Grand Slam next year
Richard Gasquet – Roland-Garros 2024
Image Credit: Baptiste Autissier / Panoramic
French veteran Richard Gasquet has decided to stop. Not immediately, but he has confirmed a farewell date: it will be at Roland-Garros in 2025 in front of his home crowd. He will be the third of the “Musketeers” to retire from professional tennis after Gilles Simon and Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.
Down to 133rd in the world rankings, Gasquet has been dropping clues since the beginning of the season about his future retirement before he finally made it official in the columns of L’Équipe.
“It’s the best tournament to do it. It’s beautiful, we’re lucky being French to be able to retire in this kind of incredible place. An end is always complicated, all the former great players have often told me, it’s not easy to announce it. You never know when, how, where… Here, in any case, it goes without saying,” explained the main interested party.
A professional since 2002, Gasquet spent 19 consecutive years in the top 100, or 956 weeks in a row. It’s hard to imagine him back among the top 100 players in the world at Roland-Garros, but it would be a complete shocker if the man from Biterre didn’t receive a main draw wild card for his last hurrah.
Post-Career: Helping young people
Winner of 16 ATP singles titles since the beginning of his career, “Richie” does not fear the “little death” that makes athletes so anxious when they stop. The 38-year-old has understood that he has come to the end of the journey as a player.
“It’s not heartbreaking because I gave it my all. I’ve played so much, so many matches… I started tennis at 3 years old, it will be 36 years of training, every day!! I started in the pros in 2002, and I’ll be here 23 years later… Twenty-three years on the circuit! I can’t give more, quite simply, I can’t go any further.”
I want to take care of young French people, to be on the court with 14-15 year olds.
Richard Gasquet on his future plans
The three-time Grand Slam semi-finalist (Wimbledon 2007, 2015 and US Open 2013) already has some ideas: his post-career will be associated with the French Tennis Federation (FFT) and the young people he wants to see grow up.
“I’ve been talking to president Gilles Moretton for a little while now. We had very good discussions about tennis, I get along very well with him. He’s passionate and we have the same vision of things. The same goes for Ivan Ljubicic, director of the high level and Riccardo Piatti. I know that I will be able to help them in their mission.”
“I want to take care of young French people, to be on the court with 14-15 year old guys. When I was training at the CNE, I saw them all come and go!! I have always followed their progress. With Fils, I trained with him when he was 15, I saw right away that he was playing well… There, there are one or two who play really well!”
Before that, there are still a lot of tournaments to enjoy. In 2025, Gasquet will begin his final season with the Australian Open qualifiers and he hopes “To close the loop well.”
People in this post
More tennis news
Li Na: “Just because I’m not playing tennis doesn’t mean I’m completely detached from it”
“ITIA did not contact us directly” – Swiatek’s drug manufacturer rebuts tennis watchdog’s claim
“Couldn’t have dreamt of a better forever” – Auger-Aliassime gets engaged to Ghaibi
Fonseca completes Next Gen ATP Finals 2024 line-up
“One regret that Nadal probably has is he missed a lot of Majors because of injury” – Patrick McEnroe
