It was a French affair on the ATP Tour and Challenger Tour this week. And Arthur Fils was following the results of his countrymen Arthur Cazaux and Richard Gasquet, who were competing for titles on the other side of the world.

Set to play in his first Challenger final in Oeiras, the 18-year-old Fils had seen the results from Cazaux, who won the Nonthaburi Challenger on Saturday and Tour-veteran Gasquet, who collected the title at the ATP 250 in Auckland. He used that as inspiration to claim a title of his own in Portugal.

“I saw Luca [Van Assche] win the Maia Challenger not that long ago, I saw that overnight Arthur Cazaux did it, I saw that Richard Gasquet did it today. I said, ‘Okay you have to win this one!’” Fils said, while cracking a laugh during his post-match press conference.

Fils, who enjoyed a standout junior career, hopes to be part of France’s next crop of great players. In 2021, he was a finalist at the Roland Garros boys’ singles event, only losing to countryman Luca Van Assche, who earned his maiden Challenger title in December. That same year, Fils teamed with close friend Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard to capture the Roland Garros boys’ doubles crown.

Following his triumph in Portugal, Fils joined an exclusive list of French Challenger champions aged 18 and under: Gasquet, Sebastien Grosjean, Gael Monfils, Fabrice Santoro, Corentin Moutet, and Van Assche. Now at a career-high 195 in the Pepperstone ATP Live Rankings, Fils is the first teenage Challenger champion of 2023 and the youngest French player in the Top 200.

After dropping just one set all week at the indoor hard court event, including ousting top seed Ricardas Berankis, the French teen was asked what he will remember most about this week in Oeiras. Fils joked, “I will remember that I lost one set and it was 0-6! But no, I will remember the final and the great atmosphere.”

It’s been nearly 40 years since a Frenchman won a Grand Slam (Yannick Noah, 1983 Roland Garros). While the European country has had many consistent professionals since, Fils is hoping the four-decade drought doesn’t last much longer.

“It was tough for Tsonga, Monfils, and Gasquet because they came in the same generation as Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic, they won everything,” Fils said. “Maybe when Nadal and Djokovic retire, we will have more opportunities to win a Grand Slam.”

Perhaps the next great French tennis champion is currently making progress on the Challenger Tour.

Daniil Medvedev’s unique game and personality has been captured in the launch of his very own logo. As he takes his partnership with Lacoste to new heights, the 15-time tour-level champion will now have his own co-branded collection with the iconic brand.

Medvedev made a splash in Rod Laver Arena, where he debuted the logo on his new-look polo as he opened his Australian Open campaign with a straight-sets win against Marcos Giron.

“My partnership with Lacoste is special. I consider them family,” Medvedev said, discussing the new venture. “To have this special line with Lacoste is not only exciting, it speaks for the business relationship we have. It already started some years ago when Lacoste asked me to help bring a tennis shoe to the market, which we very successfully accomplished together. To now put this special Daniil M line/logo on my clothes makes me very happy and I hope to see many fans wear these products.”

Playing off Medvedev’s love for video games — his favourite games are FIFA and Rainbow Six — the logo’s design is similar to a gaming controller. It’s not the first time Medvedev has brought his passion for gaming onto the court — after winning the 2021 US Open, his “dead fish” celebration confounded many until he revealed he was paying homage to a celebration from the FIFA video game franchise.

Each aspect of the logo tells a story. The ‘D’ and ‘M’ stand for Medvedev’s initials, while the two lines at the bottom represent the two ‘I’s in his first name. At the top of the logo is a circle symbolising a tennis ball.

Medvedev will hope his new look can help him complete unfinished business at the Australian Open, where he has reached the final in his past two appearances.

Nick Kyrgios withdrew from the Australian Open on Monday due to a knee injury. The Australian was scheduled to face Roman Safiullin on Tuesday, but will be replaced in the draw by lucky loser Denis Kudla.

“Obviously this coming around is just bad timing. But that’s life. Injury is a part of the sport. I guess I can draw some inspiration from someone like Thanasi [Kokkinakis] who has had a bunch of injuries and has bounced back,” Kyrgios said. “Look, I’m not doubting I will be back to my full strength and playing the tennis I was playing prior to this event.

“Yeah, I’m devastated obviously. It’s like my home tournament. I’ve had some great memories here. Obviously last year winning the title in doubles and playing the best tennis of my life probably. Then going into this event as one of the favourites, it’s brutal. All I can do now is just look forward, do what I need to do and come back.”

Kyrgios earned one of the best results of his career at the 2022 Australian Open, where he partnered close friend Thanasi Kokkinakis to the doubles title. The 27-year-old maintained his form throughout the year, advancing to the Wimbledon final in singles and triumphing at the Citi Open among other results.

But in the past week, discomfort in the knee led Kyrgios to undergo an MRI, which revealed a parameniscal cyst growing in his left meniscus, which is the result of a small tear in his lateral meniscus. The Australian’s physio, Will Maher, explained the injury.

“It’s not a significant injury in the sense that it’s going to be career threatening or anything like that. Even at that stage it was still worth persevering to see if we could do anything to get him back on court,” Maher said. “To Nick’s credit, he did try everything, to the point even last week he was having a procedure called a fenestration and drainage where they use a syringe to try and drain the cyst, which Nick has some pretty gruesome photos of. I’m sure he’ll probably share them later.

“Any amount of injections that he could try to get into his knee without causing long-term damage. We came to Melbourne with the hope there might be some pressure relieved from that procedure and he’d have some relief and be able to get up to a level he was comfortable to compete.”

Kyrgios pushed to try to be able to compete in the season’s first major. But the knee became more sore as the week went on.

“I think we’ve made the sensible decision to withdraw him because at this stage he wants to feel mentally comfortable that he can go seven matches, he can go the distance, and needs to be able to do potentially seven three-hour matches. Getting on the court simply wasn’t enough for him,” Maher said. “The situation now is, we wanted to prevent him from having further injury or making that injury worse.

“So now he’ll go back to Canberra at the end of the week, he’ll have an arthroscopic procedure to clean up his lateral meniscus and remove the paralabral cyst.”