Bernard Tomic - The rising star

Australia has had a great history of producing world champions and top male tennis players. This is proven by the fact that they have won the Davis Cup 28 times, (last time being in 2003) which is second only to USA which has won the cup 32 times. Norman Brookes, Pat Cash, Tony Roche, Ken Rosewall, Todd Woodbridge, Mark Woodbridge, Bill Sidwell, Adrian Quist, John Newcombe, Rod Laver and Lleyton Hewitt are a few famous tennis players from Australia. With such a glorious past , the country has been regularly producing grand slam champions and world number 1s. With Hewitt sidelined due to hip injury and last winning a grand slam in 2002, the last few years have not been that great for Australian tennis. As the past suggests, they produce champions on a very regular basis and there is one Australian teenager who has already broken into the top-50 and is considered to be the next big thing in tennis.

Born on 21^st October,1992 in Stuttgart, Germany to John and Ady, he has already reached a career high ranking of 41 and who knows , 2012 could be his year. His parents relocated to Queensland after a few years and he started playing tennis at the age of 7. Since then there has been no looking back as he won the prestigious Orange Bowl tournament in 2004 and 2006, first in the under 12 category and then the under 14 category.

He played his first tournament on the junior circuit in 2006 ( at the age of 14 ) , he successfully qualified for the event and went on to win the tournament. He won the next 3 tournaments he played in and took his unbeaten match winning streak to 26. In 2008, he became the youngest player in the open era to win the Australian Open Junior Boy’s Championship defeating the 25^th,11^th,8^th and 1^st seed before beating the 10^th seed to win the title. He couldn’t win any other junior grand slam championship before winning the junior US Open by defeating Chase Buchanan in the finals with a score line of 6-1, 6-3.

He turned pro in 2008 and participated in a few ITF futures and was also involved in a controversy, due to which ITF suspended him from playing professional tournaments for a period of 1 month. He finished the year ranked 763.

In 2009, He was given a wild card at Brisbane international and Australian Open. He lost in the first round in Brisbane but defeated Potito Starace in the 1^st round of the Australian Open becoming the youngest ever male player to win a senior Australian Open Grand Slam match loosing to Gilles Muller of Luxemborg in the next round. He later won the ATP challenger tournament held in Melbourne defeating Marinko Matosevic and reached the quarter finals in Burnie. He also got a wild card at the French Open but lost in the 1^st round and failed to qualify for the Wimbledon championships loosing in the final round of qualifying. He ended the year ranked 286.

In 2010, he again reached the 2^nd round of Australian Open loosing to Marin Cilic in five sets. In February he won the ATP challenger tournament in Burnie and also represented Australia in the Davis Cup. He qualified for the Wimbledon but failed to make it to the main draw of US Open finishing the year just outside 200.

In 2011, he started the year ranked outside the top 200 but finished the year in the top 50 becoming one of the biggest movers of 2011. This year, he was able to reach the 3^rd round of his home grand slam loosing to Rafael Nadal. In February, he reached the finals of a challenger tournament in Australia and then reached the 2^nd round at the Masters event in Indian Wells. His biggest breakthrough of the year came at the Wimbledon championships where as a qualifier, he reached the quarter finals winning 7 consecutive matches and becoming the youngest player since Boris Becker 1986 to reach the quarter finals of the championships. In the main draw, he defeated world no.5 Robin Soderling, Nikolay Davydenko, Xavier Mallise and Igor Andreev before loosing to the eventual winner Novak Djokovic in the quarters. With this performance, he finally broke the top 100 barrier and reached the 2^nd round of Masters event in Canada and US Open. Later in the year, he broke into the top 50 after reaching the quarter finals in Tokyo and Pre-quarter finals at the Masters event in Shanghai. His highest ranking of the year was 41 and is currently ranked 42 in the world.

With a fantastic 2011 behind him, he aims to be in the top 10 before his next birthday which could very well be possible if he continues to show these kinds of result. A great result at his home Grand Slam could very well take him in the top 25 in the first month of the year and ensure that he has every chance of fulfilling his aim and many, believe that is the player to watch out for in 2012. A very interesting fact to note in 2012 would be his performance against the top-4 i.e Djokovic, Federer, Nadal and Murray because if he wants to win a major tournament, he would have to end the domination of these players. Also, his performance against the top 10 players would be very crucial for him to fulfill his goal.