Gael MONFIS on injury: “Physio has been very helpful. He said the connection was good.”

French tennis player and husband of Elina Svitolina Gaelic Monfils Defeated Briton Cameron Norrie in the first round of the Masters in Cincinnati.

In the middle of the first set, Monfils injured his left knee while shooting a shot as it seemed to him, as a result of which he twitched in pain and began to limp badly.

“Physio was very helpful when he went to court, to be honest. He told me that the package was fine, everything was fine, everything seemed stable.

I had to get this out of my head and focus. All these weeks I felt good … I believed that I could win even with this pain, and I succeeded, ”the Frenchman said.

Monfils admitted that the left knee still bothers him and talked about his struggles over the years to maintain good form and a consistent performance schedule.

“It’s pretty hard to talk about because it’s very difficult to be in the athlete’s shoes. People only see the good. Athletes are always smiling, always showing a show, charisma, victories, followers, beautiful photos and more. They’re never there when it rains, when the coach tells you to work or something.

They think we are robots. Wow, we wake up and with great pleasure we run for an hour and do fitness.

Some days are harder like everyone else. We are better at this as athletes because we have that discipline,” said Gael.

In the second round, Monfils will face Australian tennis player Alex de Minaura.