Three to watch on Friday 

His son, Teikhon, is only two years old so is a little young yet to realise what Daddy does. Daddy, then, will have to play on a bit longer for Teikhon to build any lasting memories of the old man at work. Then again, Kukushkin’s career has always been about his family.

His father, Alexander, introduced him to tennis at the age of six and then went on to coach him until he was 17. After that, it was his former wife, Anastasia, who took over the coaching duties for several years. The two met while she was working at the Spartak Club in Moscow and after a couple of years, she decided to leave her job and travel with Mikhail full time. Juggling their personal and professional lives had its problems but, for the most part, they made an effective team.

“Every player has up and down situations in his game, some players think this is because of the coach, not because of him,” Mikhail explained. “I know that if I play bad it is not because of my coach, it is because I prepared badly or my physical condition is bad. It is not about changing the coach. We just try to see what is better for me, to become a better player. We always start from this position.” 

But now, it is all about little Teikhon and seeing whether he will ever get to see Daddy back in the spotlight. To help realise that goal, Daddy has to beat Francesco Maestrelli, Italy’s world No.206, on Friday.

Three to watch

Katie Volynets (USA) v Oksana Selekhmeteva

Maybe if the colouring books had been more interesting, the WTA tour would never have heard of Katie Volynets. When she was five, she was tired with colouring and asked her dad if she could borrow his racket and play some tennis. 

It all started from there – hitting a few balls in the house then progressing to the local park and then the tennis club. Fast forward 17 years and she is aiming for a third main draw appearance in Paris with only Selekhmeteva standing in her way. And with a name like Volynets, you have to think that Katie was born to play tennis.

Zizou Bergs (BEL) v Mathias Bourgue (FRA)

Named after Zinedine Zidane (whose nickname is Zizou) and looking very like his countryman David Goffin, Bergs would seem to have his sporting credentials in good order. But there is more to the Belgian than forehands and backhands: he also has artistic genes. He is something of a musician, playing both piano and guitar, and his mother is a professional photographer. 

And those genes are his strength and his weakness. He likes to be creative – Bergs is no baseline grinder – and when it works, he wins. It is just that it does not always work. Preferring the faster, indoor hard courts, clay is not his surface of choice (although he won a Challenger on the stuff last month) but, even so, he is only two sets away from making his Roland-Garros main draw debut.

Hailey Baptiste (USA) v Tamara Zidansek (SLO)

Three years ago, Zidansek would never have thought she would be in this position. In 2021, she reached the semi-finals here – her best Grand Slam result by a country mile – and six months later, she reached a career-high ranking of No.22. The world was her oyster, or so she thought. 

But then injuries and illness got in the way (she had shoulder issues and then bacterial pneumonia last year) and now she is No.131 in the world and trying to fight her way through the qualifying competition. She came through last year so she knows what she has to do but she also knows that, as she put it, “first round of qualies is tough, second round is a little bit easier, third round is the hardest."