Gasquet Ready for the Hopman Challenge

French tennis player Richard Gasquet has landed in Australia ahead of the Hyundai Hopman Cup tie against China where he will partner Marion Bartoli as part of the second seeded French team. The world number 19 immediately went to court to have a hit-up in Perth in order to get acquainted with the conditions. Gasquet had an hour long session with local player and world number 86 Matt Ebden and it was a good session for both the players as they are both looking for practice before the start of the summer.

The Frenchman reached a career high ranking of number 7 after going on a brilliant run in 2007 during which he won the hard court title in Mumbai, India and reached the semi finals and quarter finals stages of Wimbledon and the Australian Open respectively. But frequent injuries meant that he could not keep up the momentum that he had and finished the 2009 season at a lowly 52^nd place. But since then, Richard Gasquet has come back to the court a lot fitter, stronger and wiser and he believes that he is good condition to earn the first ever Hopman Cup win for his country along with Marion Bartoli.

Currently ranked 19^th in the world, the 25 year old says that he still has age on his side and that is always a good thing in tennis these days because the younger players are extremely fit and one has to compete with them at every level.

Although Richard Gasquet is not in the top 10 at the moment, he believes that a few good results will get him there and he is hoping that he can finish the year off with at least one major title to his name and a decent position in the ATP rankings.