The French players at SW19

The French have a brigade stronger than their army at the SW19. Lead by Jo Wilfried Tsonga, there is Richard Gasquet, Gael Monfils, Gilles Simon, Nicholas Mahut , Julien Benneteau and the lone woman ranger Marion Bartoli who is ranked at no.15.

Among these players, I love watching Richard Gasquet- the strongest reason being his single fisted backhand and that he gravitates to the net at every opportunity and treat the grass surface as grass and not hammer blows from the baseline.  The problem is we all know that the these players with the exception of Tsonga will not reach beyond the quarter finals.  

Gasquet has played in 7 Wimbledon championships and his best result has been the semifinals in 2007. Gael Monfils has never progressed beyond 3^rd round, Gilles Simon has done one round better than him and so has Benneteau. Bartoli has played in 10 championships and her best result came in 2007 as a Wimbledon Finalist. Tsonga has shown the most promising performance. Ranked at No.7, he has played in 5 championships and his best result has been the semi-finals in 2011 where he beat Federer and in 2012.

 All these players have been around for at least 10 years on the tour and may never beat their peak results which are at best average.  Many of them are in top 20 and their rankings will slide even further as years progress (Lleyton Hewitt at No.82). 

But Hewitt at least got the kiss the trophy in 2002 and enjoy a brief fling with being No.1.