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Events and Attractions

French Open To Crown First-Time Women's Champion; Nadal Criticizes Umpire

With the four remaining grand slam winners "all falling in their fourth-round matches Sunday at the French Open," there will be a new women's major champion crowned Saturday at Roland Garros, according to Ben Rothenberg for the N.Y. TIMES. It is the first time that no past major winners have reached the quarterfinal stage at a women’s grand slam event since the 1979 Australian Open, and the first time in Paris since '77. Venus Williams, Svetlana Kuznetsova, Samantha Stosur and defending champion Garbiñe Muguruza lost Sunday, "leaving a dozen women in contention who have never won a major." A "new crowd favorite appears to have emerged quite clearly." Kristina Mladenovic, the 13th seed and the highest-ranked Frenchwoman, "rode a sonic wave of crowd support" through her 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 win over the fourth-seeded Muguruza. Her supporters "reacted with maximum volume to nearly any point she won." Muguruza, in her first defense of a major title, was "visibly agitated by the hostile reception, and she wagged a disapproving finger at the crowd as she walked off the court." Sam Sumyk, Muguruza's coach, who "happens to be French," said, "The French crowd was pathetic today. No class" (N.Y. TIMES, 6/4).

'WE'RE NOT MACHINES': The AFP reported Rafael Nadal blasted French Open umpire Carlos Ramos for treating him like a "machine" and suggested he was being "unfairly targeted in an effort to speed up play." Nadal reached a record-tying 11th French Open quarterfinal but his "joy at matching Roger Federer's mark for last-eight appearances in Paris was overshadowed by an astonishing broadside at Ramos." The umpire warned the 31-year-old in the first set for slow play and again in the third before deciding to dock Nadal a first serve. Nadal said, "If you want to play well, you have to let players breathe a little. We're not machines that cannot think. That's my viewpoint" (AFP, 6/4).

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