PERTH: Australia’s top-ranked female player Samantha Stosur believes she is poised to the make the quantum leap into the rarified air of the top 10 next year.Speaking shortly after she arrived in Perth yesterday to prepare for her season-opening duties at the mixed teams Hopman Cup, which starts on Saturday, the world No. 13 said her confidence had only continued to rise during a breakthrough 2009, including her first singles title.
The imposing 25-year-old, who will be paired with dual grand slam winner Lleyton Hewitt in the Hopman Cup, said continued hard work and discipline would ensure a further rise in the rankings in 2010.
“I have had the best year of my career this year and I hope to build on that,” she said.
“I have improved a lot and it is all going in the right direction.
“I’d love to be top 10 and I am not too far off it and that is definitely the next goal.
“I am only going to get there if I keep doing what I am doing.”
Stosur said the guarantee of three singles matches under the Hopman Cup round robin format offered perfect preparation for the Australian Open, the new year’s first grand slam starting Jan 19 in Melbourne.
Blessed with one of the biggest serves in women’s tennis, she believes she has all the necessary weapons to snare a gram slam singles title, and that it is just a matter of fine-tuning her game.
“If I can keep improving my game anything is possible,” she said.
“If I match up my game against a lot of the girls that have won grand slams, I have got as good a serve as them, I’ve got as good a forehand, I move well and everything else.
“It just tidying all those things together and making it happen for that two weeks of the year.
“Two weeks is a long time to peak and you have to get used to playing great players day in, day out.
“There is no reason I can’t.”
Stosur and Hewitt open their Hopman Cup campaign on Saturday against the Romanian pairing of Sorana Cirstea and Victor Hanescu. — AFP