Todd Woodbridge and Sam Stosur imagine Australian gamers can go deep at this 12 months’s clay-court Grand Slam event.
Melbourne, Australia, 25 Might 2024 | Leigh Rogers
Todd Woodbridge and Sam Stosur are optimistic that Australian gamers can carry out properly at Roland Garros 2024.
The clay-court Grand Slam event, performed within the French capital of Paris, is historically thought-about essentially the most troublesome main for Australians to win.
Nonetheless, Stosur believes that narrative is altering.
“There’s no the explanation why Aussies can’t do properly (at Roland Garros),” Stosur declared when speaking to media in Melbourne this week.
“We do have clay courts right here, our juniors are beginning to play on it increasingly more. I by no means noticed a clay court docket till I used to be 15, however that’s definitely not the way in which it’s now.”
Stosur went on to turn out to be one in every of Australia’s best clay-court gamers, advancing to 4 singles semifinals at Roland Garros and profitable the ladies’s doubles title in 2006.
“I’d prefer to assume all of the Aussies really feel like they’ll contend at Roland Garros,” stated Stosur, a ladies’s singles finalist at Roland Garros in 2010.
“My outcomes, the outcomes of Ash Barty who gained the event, I’d prefer to assume that does give somewhat little bit of a lift and hopefully (units) the bar to try to get to in years to return.”
> READ: Australians handed difficult attracts at Roland Garros 2024
| Roland Garros Australian champions within the Open period |
||
| Occasion | Titles gained | Most up-to-date champions |
| Males’s singles | 2 | Rod Laver (1969) |
| Girls’s singles | 5 | Ash Barty (2019) |
| Males’s doubles | 8 | Todd Woodbridge/ Mark Woodforde (2000) |
| Girls’s doubles | 4 | Alicia Molik with Mara Santangelo (ITA) (2007) |
| Combined doubles | 8 | Casey Dellacqua with Scott Lipsky (USA) (2011) |
| Boys’ singles | 2 | Alexei Popyrin (2017) |
| Ladies’ singles | 1 | Lesley Hunt (1968) |
| Boys’ doubles | 6 | Nick Kyrgios/ Andrew Harris (2012) |
| Ladies’ doubles | 3 | Jessica Moore with Polona Hercog (SLO) (2008) |
| Quad wheelchair singles | 3 | Dylan Alcott (2021) |
| Quad wheelchair doubles | 1 | Dylan Alcott (2019) |
Woodbridge, a two-time doubles champion at Roland Garros, believes Alex de Minaur is Australia’s greatest probability on this 12 months’s singles competitors.
“Alex can go deep,” Woodbridge predicted of the world No.11, who’s but to progress past the second spherical in Paris.
“He’s had sufficient wins towards prime gamers on clay that if (the draw) opens up the precise approach he might sneak by way of. We’ve had the likes of Pat Rafter attain the semifinals (in 1997) earlier than on the lads’s facet, so it may be accomplished.”
C’mon, Demon 💪
In his eighth #RolandGarros, @alexdeminaur will function because the eleventh seed within the males’s singles draw. pic.twitter.com/VWASsdU1fw
— TennisAustralia (@TennisAustralia) Might 24, 2024
The 22-time Grand Slam champion is most impressed with the way in which De Minaur has “upped the ante by way of tempo off the bottom” this season.
“He’s bought greater, he’s bought stronger however he hasn’t misplaced any pace,” Woodbridge famous. “He’s taking over a way more front-foot angle and taking it to his opponents.
“It’s not his favorite (floor), however his mindset is pretty much as good as anyone’s.”
De Minaur is amongst 9 Australians on this 12 months’s males’s singles foremost draw, the best illustration in 25 years.
> READ: Australian males to set 25-year excessive at Roland Garros 2024
Major-draw motion at Roland Garros 2024 begins on Sunday 26 Might. It will likely be broadcast stay in Australia on the 9 Community and Stan Sport.
Discover your solution to play: Go to play.tennis.com.au to get out on court docket and have some enjoyable!