Edouard Roger-Vasselin disappointed in Marion Bartoli's comments on doubles

French doubles star Edouard Roger-Vasselin wasn't a fan of the comments fellow compatriot Marion Bartoli made against the doubles game. 

Bartoli, the 2013 Wimbledon champion, suggested that having less doubles tournaments and shifting some money from doubles to singles could be one of the ways to help the lower-ranked players .

"I know I'm not going to make myself friends but I think we have to say it: I don't understand all these doubles competitions all year round," Bartoli told Tennis Majors.

"I understand during Grand Slams and the Olympics because doubles is part of tennis history (but) I've been to some tournaments now with my player and I see now, these (doubles) players, they have crews, like six people around them. When I was a player, as a singles player, we couldn't afford to pay six people to travel with us full-time. They can afford to pay six people and they just play doubles! 

"Why don't you get some of that money to qualifiers, to someone who plays only Challengers? I just don't understand because in doubles, you just don't make the same effort as a singles player. You don't practice as much....they keep going, week in and week out, getting that money. I don't know if we have to stop doubles completely, but to get less money and give that money to qualification and others, that should be a solution."

Roger-Vasselin, a former doubles world No. 6, won his lone Grand Slam doubles title at the French Open in 2014. 

"I don't think it's possible to organize tournaments strictly reserved for singles. Historically, there has always been singles and doubles, it is the soul of tennis. And on the other hand, a few years ago, we changed the rules to make the doubles matches shorter: two sets with No-Ad (no advantage at 40/40) and a super tie-break in the third set," Roger-Vasselin told Eurosport France, as revealed on We Love Tennis France.

Edouard Roger-Vasselin says hearing negative comments about doubles is a shame because French players enjoy big success in the competition 

France's Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut have been one of the most successful teams over the last five years as they collected a Calendar Grand Slam in doubles when they won the Australian Open doubles title last year. 

"It's still a shame that in France we have a bad image of the doubles player, when we have the best specialists in the world: between Pierre-Hugues (Herbert) and Nico (Mahut) who are the best French team in history and Kristina (Mladenovic) who was No. 1 and won a Grand Slam title," Roger-Vasselin said. 

Edouard Roger-Vasselin, 36, is now ranked at No. 18 on the doubles list.

from Tennis World USA https://ift.tt/2XkJ2Bv