“I don’t want to make excuses, but…” – Stomach bug limited Ruud against Zverev

Casper Ruud revealed that a stomach bug hampered him in his four-set defeat to Alexander Zverev in the Roland-Garros semi-finals on Friday night.

The Norwegian started well, winning the first set, but soon faded as Zverev won the next three comfortably, prevailing 2-6, 6-2, 6-4, 6-2 to advance to the final. 

“Towards the middle, end of the first set, I started feeling some discomfort, an ache in my stomach,” Ruud explained after the match.

“It was a little bit unfortunate. I started well,” the No 7 seed continued. “I wasn’t able to keep the intensity and the energy level up. It was something that was bothering me.

“Just kind of limiting me from playing the way I want to. It was a pity.”

Ruud’s stomach issue the same as Sabalenka’s?

The scenes on Court Philippe-Chatrier were eerily familiar. Aryna Sabalenka, the women’s second seed, had also suffered from a stomach issue in her quarter-final loss to Mirra Andreeva.

Is there something going around at Roland-Garros?

“I don’t think so, because it’s been only her and I, I think,” said Ruud. “I was watching the match, actually Sabalenka, and she also seemed maybe a little bit unwell. I’m not sure if there’s something going around.”

“Maybe just unlucky. Maybe it was something I picked up in my dinner last night, maybe it was from the breakfast this morning, or something just before that I got in my stomach.”

The disappointment for the two-time Roland-Garros finalist was palpable, however, with Ruud unable to play close to his best on Friday.

“Disappointed that it had to be today,” the world No 7 reflected. “Why couldn’t it be yesterday or the day before when I had three days off?

“It was a bit unlucky. I was really looking forward to the match. In a way I started well, but yeah, I wasn’t able to keep it up, unfortunately. Just unfortunate.”

Ruud looking forward to time off

While many players are charging straight from the clay of Paris to the grass of Germany and England, Ruud will be embracing some much-needed time off instead.

“I think I have played maybe 50 matches already the first five months of the year. It’s going to be nice with a few weeks off,” he confessed.

Earlier, on an episode of UTS’s ‘All on the Table’ podcast, the Norwegian had detailed how the grass season is his only real window for some time off in the calendar year. 

“I won’t play any events leading up to Wimbledon. No offense to Stuttgart or ‘s-Hertogenbosch, but I won’t be glued to the TV for those events. Next week I don’t think I will watch much tennis.”

With clay the priority for Ruud – he often plays post-Wimbledon clay 250s – he’ll be heading into this next section of the year with a very different mindset and set of expectations, compared to the recent European clay swing.

“I think it’s a very fun surface, and I have been joking a little bit about certain things before,” Ruud said. “But I think it’s a very fun surface to play on because it brings something completely different. 

“It challenges me in a way that I think is good for my game in a way to be challenged.”

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