Matthew Paumard et Marc Durieux created a surprise in the first round of French Championships 2024 by taking out the 10th seed, Matthieu Armagnac / Morgan Mannarino.

After this victory, they returned to the microphone of Padel Magazine on their victory and their association. They also returned to the system of France 2024 and the notable absence of Benoît Théard and Thibaut Pech.

And of course, they moved on to their next round: Julien Seurin et Adrien Maigret.

The surprise victory against Mannarino / Armagnac

Mathieu Paumard: “We did have a tactic in mind. We had already played them twice so we had the benefit of hindsight from having lost those games. We tried to change things so we started this match very motivated. We said to ourselves that it could be a fairly affordable draw, that we could do something.”

Marc Durieux: “We can say that the draw was rather favourable to us, but we have to manage to win. This morning, Mathieu and I were saying that we had never won against them and that maybe this was the moment, at the French Championships. We are very happy.”

The Lozano / Perez Le Tiec draw

Mathieu Paumard: “One of the best teams between 17 and 32 is the pair Damien Lozano / Pierre Perez Le Tiec. When they learned their draw, of course, it was hard for them but unfortunately that's the law of the draw. Afterwards, I told Pierre that next year, they will be in the top 16 and that they won't have this problem.”

Default teams at France 2024

Marc Durieux: “Taking a team in March for such a distant event is a bit early. Especially for guys at this level, with regular changes of partner. Maybe we need to do something about that.”

Mathieu Paumard: “We should choose the pairs in mid-June, end of June… That would remove a bit of delay, going from 6 to 3 months. That could be a bit better and we would have less of this problem.”

P3000, absence of Théard / Pech, an expanded table…

Marc Durieux: “A P3000 is the biggest tournament category, so you need the biggest field possible. So we absolutely have to find a solution so that this can be the case.

Personally, two years ago, we didn’t like that it was a P3000… now we won the first round so we’re pretty happy. But we have to find a strategy so that the best are there…”

Mathieu Paumard: “Perhaps we could accept more pairs, increasing to 48 teams. The tournament would start at the 32nd and no longer at the 16th. There is this capacity, in France, with the number of fields, to do this type of tournament over three days. This would allow us to no longer have very strong teams on the side, like Theard / Pech.”

A lasting pair and a strong friendship

Marc Durieux: “We both have very busy professional lives so we don’t have time to train more than that… Before being partners, we were very good friends and this dimension of going to a tournament by combining the sporting and the human, that’s what predominates. We know that, sportingly, we give our all, but that if it doesn’t work out, humanly, we’ll have a good time. We leave our families alone so we have to make the most of the time we have there.”

The pre-match against Seurin / Maigret

Mathieu Paumard: “We’re going into it with a knife between our teeth, telling ourselves that it’s playable, as we would have done on any pair. We have nothing to lose and we have to approach the match believing in it.”

Marc Durieux: “We have to play to our strengths. The pitch is quite fast, with fast Wilson balls as well. We will try to put our striking strengths forward. We will play with our weapons, trying to play the best possible match with a lot of determination. We have to play without complexes, we won the first match, our contract is fulfilled, so now, we have to enjoy ourselves.”

Gwenaelle Souyri

It was her brother who one day told her to accompany him to a padel court, since then, Gwenaëlle has never left the court. Except when it comes to going to watch the retransmission of Padel Magazine, World Padel Tour… or Premier Padel…or the French Championships. In short, she is a fan of this sport.

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