Britain’s leading players had already turned their thoughts to grass before the first weekend of the French Open after another disappointing grand slam showing.For the third major tournament in row, no British singles player made it through to the fourth round, with Katie Boulter and Fran Jones the only two to even win a match here.British players struggling on clay is nothing new – last year’s French Open, when Jack Draper and Cameron Norrie both made the fourth round, was an outlier.The individual circumstances also need to be taken into account, with Draper unable to play at all due to injury and Norrie retiring during his first-round match as he battled a rib problem.Sonay Kartal, who would also have had direct entry, is another player currently sidelined, while Emma Raducanu arrived in Paris desperately short on matches after illness.The Lawn Tennis Association can justifiably point to the fact that there were 16 British players across the singles main and qualifying draws – the most here in the open era.The majority of those were in qualifying, though, with only Toby Samuel ultimately making it through, and, while the depth is much better than at the height of Andy Murray’s success, the lack of a reliable performer at the latter stages of grand slams is what grabs the headlines.Anne Keothavong is optimistic for British chances on grass (John Walton/PA) (PA Archive)Britain’s Billie Jean King Cup captain Anne Keothavong, who is part of TNT Sport’s coverage of the tournament, told the Press Association: “We have been spoiled with Andy Murray doing what he did for so many years.“We’ve been unfortunate Jack Draper’s been out injured, it’s not like we don’t have players who can be involved in the second week, but it does take a bit of luck sometimes, and patience.“We’ve got the strength in depth. The number of guys ranked inside 250 is, I think, the highest it’s been for a long time. On the women’s side, we’re still working towards that.”There is reason to be optimistic for the grass-court season, with British players generally more at home on the surface than their foreign counterparts, while wild cards offer a golden chance for big ranking boosts.Jacob Fearnley, who will need a wild card into Wimbledon having seen his ranking plummet outside the top 100, said: “I feel like the state of British tennis is pretty good.“I think, going into the grass season, the Brits tend to do well. I think you’ll see probably some people you’ve never heard of before making really deep runs in a lot of big tournaments.”Raducanu, of course, left that category almost as soon as she had entered it and, five years on from her US Open title, she is still trying to recapture the heady heights of that New York fortnight.Her latest step has been to rehire Andrew Richardson, the coach who guided her to that title, and Keothavong said: “It’s great to see her working with Flex (Richardson) again and hopefully they can build on their relationship and she can have a strong grass-court season where she’s really comfortable.“Expectations should remain low because there’s still so many unknowns when you haven’t played that many matches. I think the biggest thing is for her to remain fit and healthy.“For every British player, you want to win as many matches as possible in front of a home crowd but you’ve also got to be able to look at the bigger picture. She’s still so young, there’s still so much tennis that needs to be played.”:: Every match of Roland-Garros is live across TNT Sports and HBO Max