One week before the French Open, which will take place from June 30 to July 3 at the Golf National in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines, 24 French people are among the 156 players in the tournament. Five landed their tickets on Monday during qualifying at Apremont and Courson.

As every year since 2005, places in the field of the French Open were to be taken during the two qualifying events, contested simultaneously on Monday, June 20 on the courses of Apremont in the Oise and Courson in the Essonne. The four tickets at stake at the Exclusiv Golf Apremont went to the Argentinian Tano Goya, the French Frédéric Dauchez, the English Craig Farrelly and, after a six-party play-off, the Australian. Dimitri Papadatos. At the Exclusiv Golf Courson-Stade Français, four Tricolores seized the four places: Mathieu Decottignies-Lafon, the amateur Jérémy Gandon, Alexandre Widemann and Franck Daux, the latter after a four-way play-off.

20160425_OpenFrance2016_RoryMcIllroyStarMondiale100thEdition_01These five qualified Frenchmen join in the field of their national open their 19 compatriots exempted by other means. Among these, Clément Berardo will play the French Open thanks to his category 16 on the European Tour; Clément Sordet, Matthieu Pavon, Damien Perrier and Adrien Saddier thanks to their national professional ranking position; and finally Romain Langasque thanks to an invitation. These six come in addition to the 13 Tricolores holding a full category this season on the European Tour: Victor Dubuisson, Gary Stal, Alexander Levy, Julien Quesne, Raphaël Jacquelin, Grégory Bourdy, Benjamin Hébert, Romain Wattel, Michaël Lorenzo-Vera, Grégory Havret, Édouard España, Sébastien Gros and Thomas Linard.

In total, the tricolor contingent therefore amounts to 24 representatives - for the moment. Indeed, the organizer ASO and the French Golf Federation still have five invitations, out of the maximum eight provided for by the tournament regulations. The record for the number of French people at the start of the French Open (since 1972, date of the creation of the European Tour), which has held since the 1986 edition and its 31 Blues at the start - will therefore not be beaten this year. Despite this, the chances of seeing a Habs succeed Thomas Levet, winner in 2011, are real. It will nevertheless be necessary to beat a field comprising some of the best players in the world, such as Rory McIlroy, Danny Willett, Martin Kaymer, Graeme McDowell, Lee Westwood or Luke Donald.

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