Player Profile: Milos Raonic

Milos Raonic is a 20 year old Canadian professional tennis player who in recent weeks has drawn comparisons to a young Pete Sampras, his idol growing up.

Raonic moved with his family to Canada at the age of 3 from Titograd, Yugoslavia which is now known as Podgorica, Montenegro, and began playing tennis at the early age of 8 at the Blackmore Tennis club in Richmond Hill, Ontario.

When asked why he chose tennis over Ice Hockey, widely known as Canada's national sport, he said it provided an individuality, and he felt he could spend more time training and focusing on his own game.

It has been said that his dad used a ball machine at either 6:30 a.m. or 9:00 p.m to train with because court fees "were a lot cheaper at this time".

Since turning pro in 2007 at the age of 17, Raonic has had gradual success on both the ITF Futures and the ATP Challenger series, with his large serve, heavy ground strokes and accurate volleying developing with every tournament he plays.

After finding his feet at the top level, Raonic has since qualified for several ATP World Tour events including the U.S. Open and the Australian Open.

At only his second Grand Slam appearance, Raonic showed his growing game and true potential when defeating 10th ranked Mikael Youzhny on his way to the fourth round. Despite losing to David Ferrer, Raonic received rave reviews for his performance at the Australian Open, with John McEnroe referring to Raonic as "the real deal" on Twitter.

Raonic is curenntly Canada's highest ranked player, and has tennis greats such as Martina Navratilova touting him as "a new star".

If Raonic continues to play the way he did throughout the Australian Open those comparisons to Pete Sampras might not seem so far fetched. He has his entire career ahead of him and with his heavy serving and supreme volleying, the sky truly is the limit.