{"id":8179,"date":"2014-01-02T08:38:48","date_gmt":"2014-01-02T00:38:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/?p=8179"},"modified":"2014-01-02T08:38:48","modified_gmt":"2014-01-02T00:38:48","slug":"france-take-crucial-step-closer-to-final","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/news\/2014\/01\/02\/france-take-crucial-step-closer-to-final","title":{"rendered":"France take crucial step closer to final"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"france\"<\/a><\/p>\n

France\u2019s hopes of winning their first ever Hopman Cup have been given a major boost after they defeated the US 2-1 at Perth Arena.<\/p>\n

World No.12 Sloane Stephens got the US off to a perfect start with a 7-5 6-0 win over Alize Cornet in the women\u2019s singles.<\/p>\n

But Jo-Wilfried Tsonga\u2019s 7-6 (7-1) 6-3 win over John Isner levelled the tie, before France won the deciding mixed doubles 6-1 5-7 10-5.<\/p>\n

France will reach the final of the mixed-teams event if they beat winless Spain on Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m so happy we got through, because the US were the best team of the group I think,\u201d Cornet said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s very stressful to play the whole match and then it comes down to 10 points in the match tiebreak.\u201d<\/p>\n

Australia\u2019s title hopes are already over after this summer\u2019s pairing of Bernard Tomic and Sam Stosur slumped to losses against Canada and Italy.<\/p>\n

Isner committed 17 unforced errors in the first set of the men\u2019s singles rubber, with three of those coming early in the one-sided tiebreak.<\/p>\n

The only break of the match came in the eighth game of the second set, with Tsonga securing the win in 76 minutes.<\/p>\n

Tsonga missed most of the second half of 2013 with a knee injury, but said he was feeling strong as he builds towards this month\u2019s Australian Open.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did a big preparation on it, a good rehab, and now it\u2019s feeling good,\u201d said Tsonga, who beat Radek Stepanek on Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cLast year I was also in good shape. I played well.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut unfortunately in the middle of the season I had this injury. This year I\u2019ll try to make sure it won\u2019t happen.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stephens, who disposed of Anabel Medina Garrigues in straight sets on Monday, overcame an early challenge from Cornet before romping through the second set.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not often I win a set 6-0, so I was proud of myself for that. I stayed tough,\u201d Stephens said.<\/p>\n

Cornet was rumoured to be struggling with a back injury before the match, but the 23-year-old denied that was the case.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt my muscle a bit sore from two days ago. But I was feeling well today on the court,\u201d Cornet said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was ready for this match. Sloane was just better than me.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

France\u2019s hopes of winning their first ever Hopman Cup have been given a major boost after they defeated the US 2-1 at Perth Arena. World No.12 Sloane Stephens got the US off to a perfect start with a 7-5 6-0 win over Alize Cornet in the women\u2019s singles. But Jo-Wilfried Tsonga\u2019s 7-6 (7-1) 6-3 win […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5894,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5894"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8179"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8179\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tennis.com.au\/wa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}