| World Junior Champions - Profiles - Gael Monfils |
 | | Monfils with the Australian Open trophy |  | | Monfils at Wimbledon 04 |  | | Monfils with Michaella Krajicek at World Champions Dinner 2005 |
Gael Monfils began his junior career in 2002, at the age of 15. He didn’t take long to win his first title, claiming the Grade 2 German Junior Open in July of that year. Although he put in some good performances in 2003, notably a quarter-final showing at the Australian Open, he didn’t really hit his stride until the Orange Bowl that year, where he lost to Marcos Baghdatis in the final.
Monfils started 2004 as he had ended 2003, reaching the final of the Grade 1 Uncle Toby’s Australian Hard Court Championships. He beat Novak Djokovic among others before losing to Mischa Zverev of Germany. That was to be the last match the Frenchman lost for eight months, as he went on a winning run encompassing the next three Grand Slam tournaments.
Over the course of 2004, Monfils became one of the most dominant junior players ever; not only did he prove virtually impossible to beat but most of his opponents could barely get a game from him. At the Australian Open, he did not come close to dropping a set and demolished his doubles partner Josselin Ouanna 60 63 in the final. He started nervously at Roland Garros, his home Grand Slam, losing the first set of his first round match to Guillermo Alcaide. From that point on, however, he was in imperious form, dropping just 22 games in 12 sets in the rest of the tournament. The Roland Garros final was as straightforward as the Australian had been, with Monfils conceding just four games in his final win over Alex Kuznetsov.
The switch from clay to grass posed no problems for Monfils, as three weeks after his Roland Garros win he added the Grade 1 LTA International Junior Championships at Roehampton to his growing trophy collection. Again, he eased through the draw without dropping a set, defeating Andy Murray in the final. Moving on to Wimbledon, and perhaps feeling the pressure of being the overwhelming favourite every time he played, Monfils struggled in the second round against Mehdi Ziadi. He eventually overcame the Moroccan 46 76 62, and from then on it was relatively smooth sailing into the final. There he faced local player Miles Kasiri, and while the match was closer than many had anticipated, Monfils almost inevitably came through, 75 76.
At this point, Monfils was odds-on to become only the second player ever, after Stefan Edberg in 1983, to complete the junior Grand Slam. However, an ill-timed knee injury left him unable to prepare properly for the US Open, and he suffered the consequences. After struggling through three-set matches in the first two rounds, his dream was ended in the third round by Viktor Troicki (SCG).
Despite the disappointment of being only the second ever junior to win the Grand Slam, Monfils’s year-end record of 31 matches won and just two lost ensured his junior career would be remembered for a long time.
Monfils had been playing Futures and Challengers throughout his time as a junior, but at the end of 2004 he stepped up to the ATP Tour level. He made an impact straight away, defeating Nikolay Davydenko on his way to the fourth round of the Masters Series in Miami in March 2005 and reaching the third round of Wimbledon three months later. His first ATP title came in August in Sopot, Poland, and he reached two further finals on home soil by the end of the year, losing to Ivan Ljubicic in Metz and Andy Roddick in Lyon.
2006 saw him consolidate his place in the world’s top 50, with no titles but wins over Roddick, Ljubicic, Marat Safin and James Blake among others. After making a smooth transition from the junior game to the world’s top 50, 2007 could be the year in which Monfils takes his game to the next level.
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