Hobart International champion Alize Cornet wants the title to act as a ranking springboard for 2016.

The French world No.42 on Saturday won her fifth WTA title, thumping Canadian Eugenie Bouchard 6-1 6-2 with a polished performance.

“It’s tough to do better,” said the grinning 25-year-old, clutching her trophy.

“Winning a title right before the Australian Open is the best thing that you can imagine.”

Boasting a career-high ranking of 11 in 2009, Cornet has previously won at Katowice, Strasbourg, Bad Gastein, and Budapest and Saturday is her first singles final since 2014.

“To start the year like that I’m really very happy,” Cornet said.

“It might help me in the Australian Open, but … I have a pretty tough draw there.”

Round one at Melbourne Park sees Cornet meet Serbian world No.82 Bojana Jovanovski, but thereafter she’s likely to face world No.2 Simona Halep.

“I don’t know what to expect, I’m just going to play match after match,” Cornet said.

“I have to arrive there in good shape.

“I have a few pains in my leg that I have to fix and then everything is possible.”

Cornet has previously beaten Serena Williams and Halep and following a good pre-season said she’s ready to take on the top-10 players. And win.

“I know I have the level now,” she said.

“I have a bit of a lack of consistency sometimes and that’s what I need to work on and for this I need to be more calm on the court and I think my attitude this week was really good.

“So I’m improving and it’s a good sign for the future.”

Cornet said she was expecting a tougher battle against Bouchard, who appeared frustrated and listless on court.

The Canadian revealed after the match she had struggled emotionally after receiving news of family issues from home.

“I couldn’t keep my focus and as soon as things started going downhill I really couldn’t keep my emotions together so things were out of my control,” the former world No.5 said.

Making her comeback from injury, when she suffered a concussion during September’s US Open, Bouchard said she was happy with her Hobart campaign.

“I’m going to take those positives and keep building on that.”

Bouchard meets Serbia’s world No.121 Aleksandra Krunic first up in Melbourne.

“I’m going to try and regroup,” Bouchard said.

“I have a couple of days to forget about it, go to Melbourne and just be excited to be at a slam.”