Camden Riviere and his long-term friend and rival John Lumley will return as favourites to take the French Open, as the event sees a record-breaking entry with up to ten qualifiers to join fourteen direct main-draw entrants. Meanwhile, Claire Fahey will once again join forces with her sister Sarah Vigrass in the women’s draw
Camden Riviere returns to the French Open as the overwhelming favourite once again, having missed the previous edition due to the clash with the World Championship in Newport. Riviere has not lost a match in Paris since 2013, and hasn’t lost a set since 2014. The bouncy court means that Riviere’s extreme retrieval and excellent hands will make ending points against him very difficult, even for the world’s best. An overall win would put Riviere on track for a third calendar-year grand slam, with just the British Open still to play.
Riviere’s main challenger for the title will be the second seed, John Lumley. Lumley goes to Paris seeking a career grand slam, having won the other Opens at least once. Lumley’s form in Paris is something of an unknown, having not played in France since 2022. He and Riviere have also not played against each other in Paris since 2017, well before Lumley’s rise towards the top of the real tennis rankings. Should a rematch with Riviere arise again, it would be their third meeting of the year, with Riviere having won six of the previous seven sets played. Riviere and Lumley will team up for the doubles, where they also enter as favourites.
Defending champion Steve Virgona also returns, drawn to play Riviere in the semi-finals. Virgona remains locked with Ben Taylor-Matthews in the battle for the fourth Eliminator slot in the World Race, with the latter drawn into Lumley in the semi-finals. Since Virgona trails Taylor-Matthews, he needs to go further in the competition to make up points. Par for each player will be reaching a semi-final, and Virgona has the easier path through the quarter-finals, due to play the winner of Lewis Williams and Darren Long. Taylor-Matthews will likely have a tricky quarter-final versus Bryn Sayers, against whom he only has a 1-in-4 win record. However, Taylor-Matthews also a higher chance of reaching the final as he has already proven he can defeat Lumley in this World Race cycle.
World number 8 Sayers remains the best-placed dark-horse, with a first-round match-up against Benedict Yorston followed by a likely quarter-final against Taylor-Matthews. His draw is kinder than world number seven’s, Robert Shenkman’s, who is lining up for a quarter-final against Riviere. The British Amateur champion only took two games off the World Champion in their last encounter in Chicago in March, making a dream run unlikely, despite the recent advances in his game.
More at threat is the seventh and eighth seeds, Lewis Williams and Nino Merola, who have drawn tough first-round matches against Darren Long and Vaughan Hamilton, respectively. Williams and Long are separated by just 1.5 points on handicap, and their only previous encounter in an Open singles match went the full five sets. Merola, meanwhile, makes his French Open debut, while Hamilton pushed Nick Howell to five sets in the last edition. Both have had strong seasons, and were the successful qualifiers at the most recent Champions Trophy, with Hamilton the favourite on handicap by 1.4 points.
The other non-seeded players have a tough road ahead. Levi Gale is due to return to competition for the first time since January, but has a first-round roadblock in John Lumley. Bathurst Cup teammates Benedict Yorston and Bertie Vallat also have difficult first-round matches against Sayers and Virgona, respectively. Yorston and Sayers have no head-to-head record, while Vallat lost to Virgona in the same fixture in 2026. The remaining chance for an early upset is Zak Eadle, who, after a strong season, will face his Bristol predecessor, Taylor-Matthews, in the first round, though the latter won in straight sets in their previous encounter in Newport.
The qualifying draw is the largest in French Open history, with ten competitors fighting it out for two qualification places. The favourites for qualification are Henry Henman and Erik Barker, the latter making his first senior Open appearance in Europe. Qualification is not a guarantee for either player. Henman must first play the winner following the match between Archie Campbell and Charlie Hurstel, and then either Neil Mackenzie or Jack Josephs, both of whom have previously spent time working at Paris. Barker, meanwhile, will await the winner of Clément Depreeuw and Jim Ludekens. Should Barker win, he will face either Nicolas Victoir or Rhys Williams, with the latter’s recent Parisian experience being a deciding game thriller in the Bathurst Cup against Depreeuw. Unlike the remainder of the competition, the qualifications will be played with the pass rule.
In the doubles competition, former World Champions Robert Fahey and Steve Virgona reunite again for the second time since their loss to Riviere and Tim Chisholm. They last joined forces at the 2024 British Open, but never reached their full potential owing to a calf injury to Fahey. They enter as second seeds, while the first seeds, Riviere and Lumley, will attempt to retake the title they last won together in 2022.
The doubles quarter-finals promise tough competition. Long time duos Taylor-Matthews and Sayers, and Gale and Williams will battle it out in one quarter-final, a rematch of the British Open doubles from 2025 which saw Taylor-Matthews and Sayers through in a fifth set. On the other side of the draw, Henman once again joins forces with Merola, while Shenkman starts a new partnership with Hamilton. All four are dynamic doubles players, and on a court where it is notoriously difficult to kill the ball, all will need to be on top form to win the best-of-5 set contest. The top two seeds both face quarter-finals against qualifiers. In one qualifier, the British pair of Darren Long and Bertie Vallat are favoured over the French pair of Nicolas Victoir and Michel Brunoro, while on the other side, Benedict Yorston joins forces with Eric Barker to play Zak Eadle and Neil Mackenzie.
In the women’s draw, no players who played the recent Bathurst Cup will return to Paris for the French Open. Instead, the tournament is headlined by Claire Fahey and her sister Sarah Vigrass. Fahey arrives in Paris having won every Open since the 2023 British Open, as well as every French Open since 2016. For Vigrass, it is her first Open tournament since the 2024 British Open. The sisters have not faced off in an Open final since the 2019 British Open, last meeting in the World Championships in Fontainebleau in 2022. They are joined by a travelling party from America, featuring Newport’s Amy Wintersteen, and Aiken’s Claire Voegele and Kadi Meldrum. The Aiken duo will pair up for the doubles, while Wintersteen joins Oxford’s Grace Beglan. Fahey and Vigrass receive a bye directly into the final.
Order of play:
Wednesday 23 September:
5:00 PM: Clément Depreeuw vs Jim Ludekens
7:00 PM: Archie Campbell vs Charlie Hurstel
Thursday 24 September:
9:00 AM: Erik Barker vs Winner Depreeuw/Ludekens
11:00 AM: Rhys Williams vs Nicolas Victoir
1:00 PM: Neil Mackenzie vs Jack Josephs
3:00 PM: Winner Campbell/Hurstel vs Henry Henman
5:00 PM: Winner Barker/Depreeuw/Ludekens vs Winner Williams/Victoir
7:00 PM: Winner Mackenze/Josephs vs Winner Campbell/Hurstel/Henman
Friday 25 September:
11:00 AM: Darren Long & Bertie Vallat vs Nicolas Victoir & Michel Brunoro
1:00 PM: Benedict Yorston & Eric Barker vs Neil Mackenzie & Zak Eadle
Sunday 27 September:
9:30 AM: Qualifier 1 vs Robert Shenkman
12:00 PM: Lewis Williams vs Darren Long
2:30 PM: Ben Taylor-Matthews vs Zak Eadle
5:00 PM: Camden Riviere vs Qualifier 2
Monday 28 September:
9:00 AM: Levi Gale vs John Lumley
11:30 AM: Benedict Yorston vs Bryn Sayers
5:00 PM: Bertie Vallat vs Steve Virgona
7:30 PM: Nino Merola vs Vaughan Hamilton
Tuesday 29 September:
10:00 AM: Winner Riviere/Q2 vs Winner Q1/Shenkman
11:30 AM: Winner Williams/Long vs Winner Vallat/Virgona
4:30 PM: Winner Gale/Lumley vs Winner Merola/Hamilton
7:00 PM: Winner Taylor-Matthews/Eadle vs Winner Yorston/Sayers
Wednesday 30 September:
10:00 AM: John Lumley & Camden Riviere vs Qualifier 1
1:00 PM: Qualifier 2 vs Robert Fahey & Steve Virgona
4:00 PM: Lewis Williams & Levi Gale vs Bryn Sayers & Ben Taylor-Matthews
7:00 PM: Robert Shenkman & Vaughan Hamilton vs Nino Merola & Henry Henman
Thursday 1 October:
1:00 PM: Amy Wintersteen vs Claire Voegele
4:00 PM: Men’s singles semi-final 1
7:00 PM: Men’s singles semi-final 2
Friday 2 October:
10:00 AM: Claire Fahey vs Winner Wintersteen/Voegele
11:30 AM: Kadi Meldrum vs Sarah Vigrass
1:00 PM: Men’s doubles semi-final 1
4:00 PM: Men’s doubles semi-final 2
Saturday 3 October:
2:30 PM: Women’s singles final
4:00 PM: Men’s singles final
7:00 PM: Amy Wintersten & Grace Beglan vs Kadi Meldrum & Claire Voegele
Sunday 4 October:
1:30 PM: Women’s doubles final (Claire Fahey & Sarah Vigrass vs Winner Wintersteen & Beglan vs Meldrum & Voegele)
3:00 PM: Men’s doubles final