by Wendy Laird
Arthur Fils was due for a meteoric rise after he won the Orange Bowl as a 16-year-old in 2020. And he mostly followed the script, rising to a high of no. 14 in the world as he impressed us all with his jump-off-the-couch-in-disbelief virtuosity.
But meteors don’t rise; they fall, which is maybe the point of the metaphor in the first place. Fils’s happened in May, when he sustained a stress fracture in his back (during a five-set WIN at the 2025 French Open). Spines being what they are, the tennis world prepared for a long stretch without him. But natural human growth hormone being what it is, the hearty youth returned to the tour in February, making the final in Doha before losing to Alcaraz.
We’re happy to have him back. His brand of tennis is the kind that sells tickets; the kind that takes advantage of muscularity, agility, and facility. The Carlos Alcaraz kind, but with a French accent.
Like Alcaraz, Fils comes across as a really nice guy. His current credo, GABOS (Game Ain’t Based On Sympathy) might be his way of quelling feelings of camaraderie when he’s locked in competition with a friend. After his quarterfinal match he told the crowd, “Even if TP [Tommy Paul] is my friend, when we are stepping on the court it’s either him or me. Well, I prefer when it’s me.”
We do, too. And we’d like to suggest a better metaphor for Fils’s ascent: How about a firework? Or a rocket? Or one of those fast-growing cultivars of bamboo? Yes; bamboo, because we’d like to see Fils dig in, flourish, and be very difficult to beat.
