American Michael Yani Loses 71-Game Epic Match At French Open

Normally when a relatively unknown American qualifier loses a match in the first round of the French Open it isn’t newsworthy. This happens all the time. But Monday morning’s result was something special.

American Michael Yani lost to Slovakia’s Lukas Lacko 4-6, 7-6 (5), 7-6 (4), 6-7 (5), 12-10. That’s a lot of numbers, so we’ll do the math for you: 71. That’s how many games the two played. If that sounds like a lot, it is. In fact, it ties the record for most games played in a French Open match since they started using tiebreakers at Roland Garros in 1973. (Obviously there are no tiebreakers in the final set.) The match started Sunday afternoon and had to be completed Monday morning after it was suspended due to darkness.

Some more fun stats to consider: Each player was broken just once over the 71 games … they played 483 points … they combined for 203 unforced errors to 185 winners.