American Donald Young is hoping that at nearly 25 years old he still has time to realise all the potential he once showed as a teenage Boy Wonder.
His 6-3 7-6 (7-1) 6-3 win over Spanish 26th seed Feliciano Lopez moved him into the third round of the French Open.
It is just the third time he has gone that far at a Grand Slam tournament since he first played as a precocious 16-year-old at the 2005 US Open.
Back then, Young was being touted as the next big thing in US tennis, seamlessly taking over from the golden generation that spawned Pete Sampras, Andre Agassi, Jim Courier and Michael Chang.
In 2003 he won the prestigious Orange Bowl under-16 title, becoming the first American to take that age division crown since Courier in 1986 and, for a period of time in 2005, he was ranked the number one junior player in the world.
He was even the only sports figure in Newsweek Magazine's "Who's next?" feature in December, 2004.
Reality, however, proved to be harshly different as the Chicagoan struggled to make it past the secondary Futures and Challengers divisions.
To date he has only reached one ATP Tour final -- at Bangkok in 2001 -- and at Grand Slams he had only twice managed to get past the second round -- before coming into Paris.
Asked if he could explain what had happened to his once blossoming career, Young replied: "Hindsight is 20/20.
"The hype came because at the time I was doing things no one else had done. It's the first for everything. You don't know how to deal with it.
"Looking at it again, you might do some things different, but I can't do it now. If I had it over to do again, I probably would do a few things different.
"Now I'm starting to play better. Not better but more consistent than before."
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