“I don’t feel like I’m the player I want to be”: Félix Auger-Aliassime cuts a raw figure after Roland-Garros exit
Felix Auger-Aliassime delivered a raw self-assessment after his Roland-Garros quarter-final loss. The Canadian admitted feeling “destroyed a little bit” and struggling to recognise his own game, despite a season many would envy. He expressed a need for time to regroup before the grass season.
Félix Auger-Aliassime, portrait, February 2026 | © UTS
“Destroyed”. “Failure”. It was his words – rare and strong on the international tennis Tour. Félix Auger-Aliassime delivered an unusually bleak self-assessment after losing his Roland-Garros quarter-final to Flavio Cobolli, admitting that a season many would envy has left him struggling to recognise his own game. “I’m 26, I’m becoming less patient with the years, I think.” You’ve known me for a few years now, so…”
The Canadian, in line to climb to world No. 4 on Monday, declined to soften the defeat with perspective. “I can’t complain about my life,” he said.” I can’t complain about my life. “But I’m in a place right now with my tennis career that’s tough. I’m a little bit destroyed today. It’s tough. I usually handle losses pretty well, I have to say – my whole career I’d go back to training with optimism and positivity. But now I feel like I’m not the player I want to be. So today’s a difficult day.
“I try to seize opportunities. You have to play good tennis, you have to be a better player, and I wasn’t up to it today. After a disappointing clay season I tried to pull myself together here, I won matches – but I haven’t progressed the way I wanted, the way I’d anticipated compared with previous seasons. Now there’s tennis to be done. I’m going to keep improving from here.”
“I need weeks to form an idea, to know how to project onto what comes next.”
Having taken the first set and, by his own account, played the better tennis in the third, Auger-Aliassime had overall to state that Cobolli was the best player on court. From there he gave Cobolli his due: “Some tough rallies, I didn’t get a look, and he just did better than me.”
The conditions, he said, blunted his weapons. With the roof closed from the end of the first set, the court played heavy. “It’s indoor, but it’s quite slow,” Auger-Aliassime said. “My serve didn’t have an impact, the forehand didn’t have an impact, and he found better solutions than me.” He was careful to head off any suggestion of grievance about the roof, which closed in anticipation of rain: “There’s no controversy at all – that’s just my own take.”
Asked about the grass season ahead, he offered no plan, only a need to step back. “I need time,” he said. “I need weeks to form an idea, to know how to project onto what comes next.”
