Andy Eases Past Monfils In Exhibition Match

Today, Andy began his final preparations for his assault on the French Open in the beautiful surroundings of the Paris Golf and Country Club. He faced Gael Monfils in the semi finals of this pre-French Open Exhibition Competition, Le Trophée de Paris.

Andy has never played this hard hitting French 18 year old before. For those of you unfamiliar with his name, Monfils was last year’s number one ranked junior losing only two matches all year. This year has seen a rapid rise up the senior rankings to stand at 80. Like Andy he has a big serve, big forehand and stands at 6′ 3″ tall.

For an exhibition match it was very competitive; Andy broke in the sixth game to lead 4-2, both players then held serve and Andy took the set 6-3.

The second set was a keenly contested affair with Andy advancing to the net more often. A service break by each player kept them on serve and sending the set into a tie-break where Andy closed out the set (7-5) and the match

Throughout Andy was in good humour bantering with the Monfils camp and generally appeared to be enjoying himself. Andy has said that he is in better shape than he has ever been before the French and says if he fails to progress there will be no excuse. He is hoping, though for good weather which will certainly help his style of play.

In the final of this exhibition event, Andy will take on David Nalbandian tomorrow. Stay tuned to AR.com for more updates from Paris.