PARIS/NEW YORK, August 21, 2006 – Gael Monfils, the 19-year-old Parisian tennis star, has signed with IMG, the world’s leading sports, entertainment and media company it was announced today by Gavin Forbes, Senior Vice President, IMG Tennis.
During the past three years, Monfils has become well known on the worldwide tennis circuit as an exciting player who fights for every point. In 2004, he was the #1 ranked junior in the world winning the Australian Open, Roland Garros and Wimbledon, for three of the four Grand Slam events. Later that year, he made his debut on the ATP circuit in Metz where he reached the quarterfinals. In 2005, he won his first ATP title in Sopot and was named the ATP’s “Most Improved Player” of the season. In 2006, he reached the second final of his career in Doha, losing to world #1 Roger Federer. He then reached the semi-finals of the Rome Masters Series and advanced to the fourth round in Paris at Roland Garros.
“Gael is not only a great tennis player and a superb athlete, but he has a fresh personality that makes him popular with players and fans,” said Forbes. “IMG is extremely happy to be managing him.” IMG executives in the US, UK and France will be involved in the global campaign for Monfils.
“I am enjoying my tennis career and am happy to be part of the IMG team,” Monfils adds. “With their expertise and global reach, I am confident they will find the right off-court career opportunities for me – while I focus on winning matches. I look forward to working with them”
Monfils’ next Grand Slam will be the US Open beginning August 28 in New York. He will celebrate his 20th birthday at the tournament on September 1. A native of Paris, Monfils is a 6’4” right-hander. He is currently ranked #29 in the world by the ATP. He finished 2005 as the #3 French player. His favorite player is Arthur Ashe, and the NBA fan says he would play basketball if not a professional tennis player.
About IMG
IMG is the world’s premier Sports, Entertainment and Media Company. IMG is a diversified global business with two major business segments: IMG Sports & Entertainment, and IMG Media. IMG employs over 2,300 people in 30 countries. Forstmann Little & Co. purchased IMG in 2004.IMG Sports & Entertainment includes: consulting services; event ownership and management; fashion events and models representation; licensing; golf course design; client representation in golf, tennis, broadcasting, European football, rugby, cricket, motorsports, coaching, Olympic sports and action sports. In addition, IMG Academies are the world’s largest and most advanced, state-of-the-art, multi-sport training and educational facility, delivering world-class sports training experiences to over 12,000 junior, collegiate, adult and professional athletes each year.IMG Media, which includes our content production subsidiaries TWI, Darlow Smithson Productions (DSP) and Tiger Aspect Productions (TAP), is recognized as a global leader in the delivery of traditional and new media content and services, with Internet, broadband and mobile expertise, transforming how audiences access and interact with content.IMG Media produces and distributes over 10,000 hours of sports, documentary, drama, comedy, entertainment, popular factual and children’s content annually, over multiple platforms across 200 countries, including award-winning television and radio programming. It also represents the broadcast rights to many of the world’s premier sporting events and has the world’s biggest sports archive with more than 200,000 hours of footage.More information about IMG is available at http://www.imgworld.com/, http://www.darlowsmithson.com/ and http://www.tigeraspect.co.uk/
For more information contact:
Madeleine Pallas, PR Manager, Europe, IMG
Tel: +44 (0)208 233 7425/ +44 (0)7973 326 422
Email: mpallas@imgworld.com