Kei Nishikori looks to continue his thrilling Australian Open run when he plays sixth seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga on Monday.
There are plenty of Japanese fans at the Australian Open and for once they've got a home-grown star of their own to cheer in the latter stages. Nishikori made his big breakthrough in 2011, cracking the top 30 to become the highest ranked Japanese player of all time and he's into the last sixteen of a slam for the first time.
It hasn't been an easy ride. He was stretched to the limit by the experienced Julien Benneteau in round three, twice coming from a break down in the third set to win 4-6, 7-6, 7-6, 6-3.
However he's looking forward to the challenge of playing Tsonga on a big court. "(We've) played couple times," he said. "We played last week (the Kooyong Classic) and played Shanghai last year. You know, he's really aggressive. He has great serve. He comes to the net a lot. But, yeah, I'm excited to get through here, Round of 16. That's my best result right now in Grand Slam. Yeah, I want to win next one."
Tsonga has been getting better with every match and he crushed Portugal's Frederico Gil 6-2, 6-2, 6-2 in round three. However he's lost both his past matches to Nishikori, losing 6-7(4), 6-4, 6-4 in Shanghai in the autumn and it's no secret that he finds his game awkward to deal with/
