You had to go back seven years in the long epic of Richard Gasquet on the circuit to find traces of a victory in Miami. As in Indian Wells, where he had taken a turn for the first time since 2016, before giving in to Jannick Sinner ten days ago, the Frenchman (36, 40th in the world) filled this void in Florida by winning. with authority against the Australian Christopher O’Connell (28, 86th) in three sets (6-4, 3-6, 6-1).
At the time, Gasquet had reached the knockout stages of both American tournaments. Doing as well in Miami will come with a feat against No. 2 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas in the next round. But the winner of the Auckland tournament at the start of the season is still capable of dazzling, like his first set yesterday where he dropped only two points on his serve in all, in the wake of a break at cold (1-1).
Out of breath in the second set and often overwhelmed by early ball catches from O’Connell, a lively player with a light and compact build, Gasquet let the storm pass before pressing the accelerator again to quickly break away 3-0 in the decisive round and end with a backhand fault by his opponent after 1h48 of effort. “I served wellcommented the winner. The conditions favor me when it’s sunny and it bounces. I play much better. When the shadow arrived, the balls were much heavier and there I become quite lazy, I lack a little power behind, my shots do not bounce. I played less well but I knew that the start of the third was important. I managed to break it quickly, it was good for confidence. He was much better than me so far, I had to succeed at all costs at the start of the third set. It gave me courage. »
His next round against a Tsitsipas diminished by an arm injury from Indian Wells could fill him with hopes but as an old roader, Gasquet is playing it safe. “Yeah, hurt guys…he sweeps. I played Sinner at Indian Wells who wasn’t very good at the knee against me and behind he made half. We’ll see. They are the best players in the world. On Sinner I had a big match and if I reproduce the same level of play, the other will have to be good, which was the case with Sinner. We’ll see what Tsitsipas offers but I think it’s going to be fine anyway otherwise he wouldn’t play. »
