Dominic Thiem started his 2024 Roland Garros qualifying campaign with a win in the first round, but after the match, he admitted that he didn't deserve a wild card.
The Austrian is part of the French Open history, and in a quite significant way, because he played in two finals in Paris. Both times, Thiem faced Rafael Nadal, and both times, the Austrian lost, but he still played in the final.
He was one of the better performers at the event in the past decade, so many assumed that he would get a wild card entry this year, especially since this would be the last time he would ever play at Roland Garros.
It would be quite unfortunate if he ended his final Roland Garros in the qualifiers, but tournament organizers made that possible. It looked like it could happen in his first match because he lost the opening set.
He then turned the match around, giving himself a chance to play at least once more, but after the match, as per Gaspar Ribeiro Lanca, he surprised many by admitting that he thought he didn't deserve the wild card.
"Honestly I had a long time to be in a good ranking. I had enough tournaments and enough time to climb up the ranking and I didn’t do it, so I kind of didn’t deserve it and that’s fine. I had 10 main draw appearances in the last years so that’s more than enough."
Nothing Thiem said is factually incorrect, but that doesn't really mean that he didn't deserve a wild card entry into the event. The Austrian left a mark on the event, and because of that, he could have gotten one, but he's ready to fight for his spot.
He's good enough to do so, and hopefully, he will because then he can have a proper send-off. The crowd he managed to bring for his match, only proves how popular he is in the French capital.
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