Paul-Henri Mathieu life and biography

Paul-Henri Mathieu is a French tennis player.

CAREER:

Singles Titles:
2007: Gstaad, Casablanca
2002: Lyon, Moscow

Doubles Titles
2008: Bucharest

Between 1997 and 2000 he trained at the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy in Bradenton, Florida. After having won the Junior title at the French Open (defeating Tommy Robredo), he made his ATP tour debut in July 2000, in Kitzbühel.

In 2005 he achieved his best ever result in an ATP Masters Series event, knocking out Andy Roddick on his way to the semi-finals at Montreal. He had a record of 2–2 in the 4 Davis Cup matches he played that year. He won both his matches against the Swedish opponents Thomas Johansson and Joachim Johansson, but lost to Russia's Nikolay Davydenko and Igor Andreev in the quarter final tie.

2006 saw him equal his best result at a Grand Slam tournament by reaching the 4th round of the Australian Open. In May a career-high ranking of 32 was attained. In the 3rd round of the French Open, he lost to eventual champion Rafael Nadal in a gruelling encounter which lasted 4 hours and 53 minutes, but amazingly only saw 42 games played (Nadal won the match 5–7, 6–4, 6–4, 6–4, with the first set lasting 93 minutes and each of the following sets longer than an hour). Many tennis players and commentators, including two-time French Open runner-up Àlex Corretja, hailed it as a classic.

2007 started poorly for Mathieu when he injured himself at the Australian Open during a 1st round encounter against Spaniard Fernando Verdasco and was forced to retire from the match. This was unfortunate as Mathieu was up 2 sets and 3–0 in the 3rd set tiebreak at the time. After returning from his injury, he reached the 4th round in Miami, beating then world number 5 Fernando González of Chile along the way, before bowing out to Andy Murray in 3 sets.

On 29 April 2007, Mathieu won his 3rd career title, the Grand Prix Hassan II in Casablanca defeating Álbert Montañés 6–1 6–1. At Wimbledon, he reached round 4 for the first time, defeating Radek Štěpánek, #17 seed (15th-ranked) David Ferrer, and 15th seed (12th-ranked) Ivan Ljubičić. He attained a career high ranking of 28 in singles after this result, entering the world's top 30 for the first time. The week after Wimbledon, he beat Italian Andreas Seppi 6–7 (1), 6–3, 7–5 in a difficult final to claim his fourth ATP Tour title in Gstaad, Switzerland. He rose to #23 in the rankings, making his top 25 breakthrough.

At the Montreal Masters, he produced one of the comebacks of the season to beat 15th seed Guillermo Cañas. Trailing 4–6 0–4, he managed to up his level of play to win 13 of the next 14 games and record a win by the score of 4–6 7–5 6–0. He followed that up with a win over Mario Ančić in round 2. In round 3, he ran into Rafael Nadal, and actually won the first set 6–3 before losing the next two 6–3 6–2.

He then made the semi-finals of New Haven losing to world number 6 James Blake in a 3rd set tiebreak. This result projected him in the world's top 20 for the 1st time, at the 20th rank.

PERSONAL:
Full name is Paul-Henri Mathieu
Nicknamed "Paulo"
Began playing tennis at age 3 1/2 with his older brother Pierre-Yves, who is a coach in Strasbourg
Father, Patrick, is a dentist; mother, Yveline, is a housewife
Also has one older sister, Aude (31)
From 1997-2000 trained at Nick Bollettieri Academy in Bradenton, Fla. before moving back to Paris
Captured Roland Garros junior title in 2000, defeating Robredo in three sets
Admired Boris Becker growing up
Underwent arthroscopic surgeries on both knees in 1997 and ‘98, missing several months
Favorite surfaces are hard and clay
Named ATP Newcomer of the Year in 2002
Has a 4-8 career Davis Cup singles record in six ties
Coached by countryman Patrice Hagelauer (sine November 2007).

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