Cazaux Shows His Ambitions: "I Want to Perform in the Biggest Tournaments"

Arthur Cazaux has gained a lot of confidence in recent days by winning the Jinan Challenger.

Cazaux is playing back-to-back tournaments in Asia. The Frenchman, who reached his career-high ranking after his week in Jinan (58th), is competing this week in the ATP 250 tournament in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

This Wednesday at 8 a.m. (French time), the 23-year-old player will face Shintaro Mochizuki, whom the Frenchman defeated just a few days ago in the semifinals in Jinan (6-1, 6-2). Before making his debut, Cazaux reflected on his goals for the coming months.

"We hesitated about playing this Challenger (in Jinan), especially in my team, they didn't want me to do it, I had already been in Asia for five weeks. But I had a bit of frustration inside me.

I felt that the tennis was there, but I lacked a bit of consistency by losing three very tight matches. I kept thinking: 'Damn, I feel like I'm not far off.'

I wanted to prove to myself that in this Challenger I could maintain that level of play. I feel like I'm progressing little by little and now I want to perform in the biggest tournaments. Whether I'm 58th or 90th, I don't think it will change much.

My goals are much higher, I want to continue to improve, to feel good on the court. For several weeks now, I've been making progress in many aspects of my game, on my baseline hitting quality and on my intentions.

I'm able to do more with the ball, to move forward more, I produce more play. Now I feel like it's really starting to take shape and I have better ball quality, especially on the forehand side. It's not necessarily stable yet, but I feel like I'm on the right track," Cazaux stated to L'Équipe.