German tennis ace Florian Mayer showed the world of tennis what they had missed out on for several years after he rallied to beat Frenchman Richard Gasquet to reach the quarter finals of Wimbledon at the All England Club.
Mayer had been hailed as the next big thing of German tennis since he broke through the scene almost 10 years back now, but failed to live up to those expectations and most of the blame should be shouldered on him as his wayward life almost drove him away from the sport.
But the round of 32 at the All England Club was witness to one of the best pure talents that the sport had never seen fulfilling its true potential as Mayer brushed aside the world number twenty to reach the quarter finals stages of Wimbledon for only the second time in his career. Read more »
Richard Gasquet; a child prodigy, dubbed ‘Baby Federer’ he experienced great success as a child. Unfortunately, this fortune has not followed him into his adult career as a tennis pro, and similarly to previous years, 2012 has proved exceedingly disappointing on the title front. A bitter repeat of 2011, Gasquet is yet to secure a title this year and he is running out of time.
So far, 2006 has been his prominent year to date and although having to venture back six years, you cannot deny the Frenchman of his sheer brilliance at that time; skilled, composed and full of flair he conquered on grass, clay and indoor carpet; 3 different surfaces illustrating his versatility and strength. Since winning Lyon, Gstaad and Nottingham in 2006, Gasquet has only managed two single titles since that time; Mumbai and Nice. He sustained a career detour and setback in 2009 when he was suspended after failing a cocaine drugs test. Although managing to clear his name and reduce the suspension after proving the cocaine was not substance abuse, but was present in his bloodstream because he had kissed a woman who was an abuser, he did not come back in the same fighting form and has had an unsatisfactory last few years.
This year he has entered many tournaments including the Australian Open where he was knocked out by David Ferrer, the Estoril Open where he advanced through the rounds to the final but lost out to Juan Martin Del Potro and the Roland Garros where Britain’s favourite Scott’s man Andy Murray championed in the fourth round ending Gasquet’s hopes of gaining a place in the quarter finals. Despite his efforts it appears Gasquet is lacking the pizazz of his rival counterparts, he needs to seriously improve his game if he intends to relive his childhood glory.
Richard Gasquet will be one of the hopefuls of pulling off what would be a remarkable French open victory in front of his home crowd in France. Gasquet reached the fourth round in 2011 which was his best performance at Roland Garros in his career. Having made the quarter final in Rome, which included a impressive victory over British number one and world number four Andy Murray. Although clay is not his proffered surface his clay game has improved significantly in recent years and the French tennis star will be eying a strong performance in this years competition.
Gasquet who is currently ranked world number twenty, will be looking to take advantage of a weak selection of the draw which sees the previous world number seven play Estonian qualifier Jurgen Zopp in the first round. Looking at the draw Gasquet would hope to be reaching the quarter finals and potentially further should he raise his game and gain some momentum as the tournament continues. A good performance in Paris will leave him in good stead heading into a highly competitive Wimbledon later in the summer, which is a tournament that Gasquet has often performed well in including a semi-final in 2007 which remain as his best grand slam performance to date.
Best known for his quality ground strokes his game is well suited to grass compare to clay, however with the crowd on his side and a good draw, this could well be a chance to register a career best performance at a grand slam, which should he do there is a very good chance he will equal or beat that record at Wimbeldon, which will restore him into the top ten players in the world.
Richard Gasquet, a young professional tennis player was born in the year 1986 and s presently 26 years of age. Richard Gasquet was born in France and is a French tennis player by profession. Talking about his profession, Richard Gasquet won the mixed doubles Grand Slam at the 2004 French Open. Richard Gasquet highest ranking till date is number 7. That is till now he has not gone higher than that rank. Richard Gasquet is once again like those tennis players who have not played very well and not performed and shown their worth. However talking about his achievements.
The best thing that goes well with Richard Gasquet and what he is famously known for is his long ground strokes and his famous one handed backhand. The 2012 season started for Richard Gasquet by performing and participating in the Hopman Cup alongside Marion Bartoli who is the top 10 Women Tennis Association pro. Alongside in the Apia International Sydney, Richard Gasquet made his presence in the quarter finals of that tournament.
Coming to the 2012 Australia Open, Richard Gasquet played against Andreas Seppi and against Andrey Gulobev. Richard Gasquet made it to the quarter finals in this tournament also at the Open Sud de France. In the year 2011, Richard Gasquet played a lot of tournaments with som being the 2011 Aircel Chennai Open, the 2011 Medi bank International Sydney, the 2011 Australia Open. After all these tournaments he succumbed to a shoulder injury after which he came back to play the 2011 Dubai Championship where he managed to reach the semi final but finally lost to the professional Roger Federer. In the first time in his career, Richard Gasquet defeated two top players back to back in the 2011 BNP Paribus Open.
It is a fight between Juan Martin Del Potro, the lanky Argentine, who is quite well weaponed along with a devastating forehand and probing serve, whereas his opponent Richard Gasquet has awe-inspiring agility and very reliable serve – so be ready to cherish a good battle between these 2 on Friday in a quarter-final game of the 2012 season Marseille ATP Open, an ATP World Tour 250 championship, being played in Marseille, France.
At present, ranked at number ten in the world, Juan Martin Del Potro ended runner-up in Rotterdam tennis championship, where he lost to the Swiss master Roger Federer in the final match. Juan Martin had his contribution of injuries following his maiden Grand Slam win in the year 2009 in US Open, but at present it appears that the Argentine tennis player has took on the entire spoilt things quite well.
Del Potro is looking for his 10th career title on tour as well as has a nice 10 – 3 win – loss record on tour in this season. The Argentine player can anticipate a tough battle against Richard Gasquet and will have to engage in his top tennis to secure a win here. Seeded 4th in this championship, Del Potro equalized the transactions at 6 – 7 (6 – 8), 6 – 4 in his match, when Nikolay Davydenko retired because of a foot injury.
Del Potro, in the head to head, has a thin lead over the French tennis player with 2 – 1. Previously, they confronted back in the year 2008 in the Tokyo championship, where Del Potro beat up Richard Gasquet in 3 laborious sets. We can anticipate some kind of tennis on Friday, since both competitors are looking in devastating from at this point of time.
After a fantastic win against Janko Tipsarevic in the third round, Richard Gasquet must have entered his encounter with fifth seed Ferrer with confidence high, but it wasn’t to be for the aspiring Frenchman.
Gasquet was playing some of the best tennis of his career in the Tipsarevic match, with just 8 unforced errors all game, compared to his 33 winners. And his groundstrokes were so good that he actually won 74% of his second serve points – actually 3% higher than his win percentage on first serve. Either way, he dominated the first two sets, and his dejected Serbian opponent had virtually given up by the time the third set appeared.
With this stunning performance under his belt, you would be forgiven for thinking he could at least take a set or two off the hard-working Ferrer in his fourth round tie. Instead, he found most of the groundstrokes that would be giving Tipsarevic a problem being scrambled back by the Spaniard, who rarely gives up on anything. Gasquet even managed to up his first serve percentage, getting a very respectable 71% in, but still only winning half the points on either of his serves. In contrast, Ferrer was keeping the pressure on when serving to his opponent, winning 83% of his first serve points, and converting 7 out of 9 break points. The match finished 6-3, 6-3, 6-1 to Ferrer, and it shows just how good his battling approach is against opponents whose confidence isn’t unshakeable – which means virtually everyone below him in the rankings.
Gasquet will be pleased he caused the upset against 10th seed Tipsarevic to get to the stage he did though, and if he can play the way he did in that match on a regular basis, he will quickly be reclaiming his spot in the top ten.
July 24, 2012 2:54 pm | 