STARS
Li Na beat Kim Clijsters 7-6 (3) 6-3 to win the Medibank International Sydney women’s singles in Sydney, Australia
Gilles Simon beat Viktor Troicki 7-5 7-6 (4) to win the Medibank International men’s singles in Sydney, Australia
David Ferrer beat David Nalbandian to win the Heineken Open in Auckland, New Zealand
Jarmila Groth beat Bethanie Mattek-Sands 6-4 6-3 to win the Moorilla Hobart International in Hobart, Australia
SAYINGS
“It’s always good to win the tournament. I mean, you never know if you’re going to win more after, so I enjoy it every time.” – Gilles Simon, after capturing the men’s singles at the Medibank International in Sydney, Australia
“I was 5-0 down and saw the time. It was only 15 minutes. I thought, ‘Yeah, the fans, they pay a lot of money and the match will be over in half an hour.’ One or two points changed it, and it turned around like that. When we got to the tiebreak, I thought it was my chance.” – Li Na, after rallying to win the Medibank International Sydney tournament in straight sets.
“I think I’ve beaten number 2, number 3, number 4, number 5 and everybody, just not number 1. So I’m really happy about it.” – Dominika Cibulkova, after beating top-ranked Caroline Wozniacki in the Medibank International Sydney tournament.
“It’s exciting because we never lost a match. We are going to play in a Grand Slam with eight matches in our pockets. We just have to focus for the matches like we did these two weeks. We have to keep it going like easy in the head and not thinking so much about what we have done. We have to look forward to what we have to do.” – Lukas Dlouhy, after he and Paul Haney upset twins Bob and Mike Bryan to win the Medibank International men’s doubles.
“It’s amazing. Something I think obviously we were hoping to do. But this is a little bit of a shock, to be honest. … “I’m from Brisbane, so to win in Brisbane and now to win back-to-back in Sydney, everyone loves winning their home title. Doing two in a row, I’m still in a little bit of shock, to be honest.” – Paul Hanley, who teamed with Lukas Dlouhy to win in Sydney, Australia.
“I think it was a very good week. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose, sometimes you play good and lose, sometimes you play bad and win. Sport is like that. Today I lost. I will try to play better every day.” – David Nalbandian, after losing the title match at the Heineken Open.
“Favorites, you know, it really doesn’t mean anything. Every match and every tournament has to be played. You all start – 128 players start from scratch. It’s the same for everybody from the start. … Every match has to be played. In sports, nothing is predictable, so I’m going to try and keep going, keep working on what I’ve been doing, and just try to improve, stay fit, rest well. We’ll see what happens.” – Kim Clijsters, saying she is taking nothing for granted heading into the Australian Open.
“Just like the flood disaster in the US, there are a lot of people that lost everything they owned, and it’s going to be a long road to some sense of normalcy. I want to continue to use my international platform as a WTA tennis player to help those who are in need, no matter if they are right next door or across an ocean.” – Bethanie Mattek-Sands, pledging a portion of her prize money to aid victims of the Queensland, Australia, flood.
SWINGING FOR DOLLARS
The world’s best tennis players showed they care, raising more than $1.8 million in the Rally for Relief, a fund-raiser for victims of the deadly flooding in Queensland, Australia. Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer, Kim Clijsters, Sam Stosur, Lleyton Hewitt, Justine Henin, Caroline Wozniacki, Novak Djokovic, Ana Ivanovic, Andy Murray, Andy Roddick, Vera Zvonareva, Victoria Azarenka as well as former players Pat Rafter and Jim Courier, entertained a capacity Rod Laver Arena crowd. “It’s all about doing something and giving back,” said Stosur, herself a Queensland resident whose family had their home destroyed in a flood in 1991. “These floods put things really into perspective.”
The ITF Board of Directors announced that, in consultation with Tennis Australia and Tennis Queensland, it will donate a minimum of $25,000 to assist in rebuilding tennis facilities that have been damaged or destroyed due to the devastating floods. At the same time, the ITF said it will also help the Brazilian Tennis Federation to rebuild tennis facilities following flooding that had affected that country.
SURPRISING WEEK
Li Na was one game away from defeat against two-time Grand Slam tournament winner Svetlana Kuznetsova, trailing 6-3 5-3 in the quarterfinals. She somehow pulled off a victory there, and then in the final dropped the first five games to US Open champion Kim Clijsters. Seeded eighth, Li ripped through the next five games to pull even at 5-all before sending the first set into a tiebreak. Again Clijsters took the lead, 3-1, before China’s top player won six straight points to take the set. When she also took the second set, Le became the first Chinese player to win a WTA Premier title, capturing the Medibank International Sydney, the final warm-up event for the Australian Open. “When we got to the tiebreak, I thought it was my chance,” Li said. If Clijsters had won, she would have moved into the number two spot in the rankings, surpassing Vera Zvonareva. Instead, the Belgian remains in the number three spot. “I’ve played here many years. Every time I saw the name of the champion and I would think, ‘Oh, when will my name be there?’” Li said. “Also, when you walk to center court, you can see many pictures of champions over there. So after today I talked to me team, saying we will come next year and see my picture.”
SO AT HOME
The World Team Cup will be played this year, after all. Two new sponsors were found for the vent, which now will be held May 15-21 at the Rochusclub in Dusseldorf, Germany. Last month, it was announced the team-format tournament, which has been held since 1978, was being discontinued because it had no sponsor. The clay court event is traditionally held before the French Open. Last year, Argentina beat the United States for the title.
STEPPING CAUTIOUSLY
Plans by the WTA to add a Premier tournament at the beginning of the year is causing ripples in Brisbane, Australia, and Auckland, New Zealand. Andrew Walker, WTA senior vice president, global marketing and communications, said the organization is aware of the concerns of the two smaller International events. Newspaper reports said the Auckland tournament was in real danger of not being able to secure quality players in the future because of the WTA’s desire to add a Premier event at the beginning of the year. “The board will be looking at the impact on our existing members and the impact on player fields and player flow,” Walker said. “That is critically important and that will be a very important consideration as to whether to put an event there.”
STRANGE RECORD
Venus Williams set a bizarre record when she played her first-round match at the Australian Open. She became the only top player to play the four Grand Slam tournaments in succession without playing any other event. Last year Williams lost to Nadia Petrova in the fourth round of the French Open. Because of a knee problem, she didn’t play again until Wimbledon, where she reached the quarterfinals before being upset in straight sets by little-known Tsvetana Pironkova. Again her troublesome left knee caused her to skip all tournaments until the US Open, where she battled into the semifinals before losing to eventual champion Kim Clijsters in a tough three-setter. The older of the Williams sisters was then sidelined for the remainder of last year due to the knee injury, yet still finished the year ranked fifth in the world, her first top-five year-end finish since 2002. This year, Williams played two exhibition singles matches in Hong Kong, losing both. But she has not competed in a WTA tour match since the US Open.
STATHAM’S THREAT
New Zealand’s Rubin Statham was so upset about being refused a wild card entry into the Heineken Open that he published a string of outbursts on Facebook, including a threat to change his nationality. Richard Palmer, Heineken Open tournament director, called Statham’s actions “silly” and “ill-conceived.” Palmer gave his main-draw wild cards to New Zealand’s top player, Michael Venus; the tournament’s second seed, Nicolas Almagro of Spain; and last year’s finalist, Arnaud Clement of France. Statham received a wild card last year when he was ranked No. 1 in New Zealand, but his ranking has since dropped.
SENT AWAY
Bruce Flory has been relieved of his duties as tournament director of the Western & Southern Open by the United States Tennis Association (USTA), which said it is seeking a replacement. Saying he was surprised by the change, Flory will remain with the tournament as a consultant through the transition. He was named tournament director in 1999 and retained his post when the USTA became majority owner of the Western & Southern Open in 2008. This year, the tournament will feature concurrent men’s and women’s play for the first time. The new format will be staged August 13-21 at the Lindner Family Tennis Center in Mason, Ohio.
SETTING BACK THE CLOCK
Margaret Smith Court believes life is too easy for today’s Australian tennis players. One of the greatest female tennis players of all-time, Court said the over-complication of coaching and training had left many promising youngsters confused. “In those early years we didn’t have psychologists, we didn’t have masseurs, we didn’t have any of that,” she said. “We just went out and played. We didn’t even have a seat to sit in until television came in.” Court said the blame for the state of the game in Australia cannot be solely directed at the players. “I think the kids are getting confused and aren’t having those basic foundations that we had like going to school. They have too many coaches who are taking them away too early. If you look at the players that have managed to come through, they’ve come through with their own coach.”
STERLING PERFORMANCES
Six tennis players, including Rafael Nadal and Serena Williams, have been nominated for the Laureus World Sports Awards to be held next month in Abu Dhabi. Only track and field, boasting seven nominees, had more athletes chosen for the prestigious award. Besides Nadal and Williams, other tennis players nominated were Justine Henin, Kim Clijsters, Caroline Wozniacki and wheelchair player Esther Vergeer, The awards, considered sports version of the Oscars, is being held in Abu Dhabi for the second year in a row. Last year’s winners of the 2010 Laureus Sportsman and Sportswomen of the Year awards included Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt for the second time, American Serena Williams, and British Formula One driver Jenson Button.
SIGNED
Martina Navratilova and Lindsay Davenport have signed multi-year contract extensions with Tennis Channel. Both Grand Slam tournament champions are part of the channel’s Australian Open coverage, which begins in a week. Navratilova will continue to be Tennis Channel’s lead match analyst in Melbourne. Davenport will work for the cable network at the year’s first major tournament for the first time, including sideline reporting.
SPONSORS
Jetstar, a fully owned subsidiary of Qantas operating out of Australia, Singapore, New Zealand and Vietnam, will become the WTA’s official airline partner in Asia-Pacific. Jetstar is the third new sponsor signed by the women’s tour in the past 12 months and the second deal in the Asia-Pacific region this year. Earlier, the Chinese apparel brand Peak became a WTA sponsor. The WTA also signed a sponsorship agreement with Oriflame, a Swedish cosmetics company and renewed its global deals with Sony Ericsson; USANA, a leading global vitamin and health supplement manufacturer ; and leading foreign exchange company Travelex. Under the three year agreement, Jetstar will serve as the WTA’s official airline in the Asia-Pacific region and receive global exposure through branding, on-court presence, local activation and marketing and digital integration across all WTA social media platforms, in both English and Chinese. Jetstar also will become the official airline partner of nine WTA tournaments in Asia-Pacific, including the Toray Pan Pacific Open in Tokyo, China Open in Beijing and Commonwealth Bank Tournament of Champions in Bali.
Automotive giant BMW will become the title sponsor of the WTA’s Malaysian Open, which will be held February 28-March 6 at the Bukit Kiara Equestrian and Country Resort. The inaugural tournament last year almost went on without a title sponsor until The Golden Horses Health Sanctuary stepped in at the eleventh hour. The BMW Malaysian Open will offer a purse of $220,000. Last year, Alisa Kleybanova won the title by defeating fellow Russian Elena Dementieva, the top seed, in the final.
The BMW Tennis Championship Challenger in Sunrise, Fla., won’t be held this year. The event served for seven years as a bridge between two ATP Masters tournaments in March. But tournament director Gabe Norona said the lack of sponsors combined with the annual cost of building bleachers at the Sunrise Tennis center was too much to overcome. “It’s been a labor of love, but it still must be economically viable,” said Norona, founder of the $125,000 Challenger and co-owner of Pro Tennis World. “BMW was coming back and the city of Sunrise has always been good to us. But plans to build a fixed facility didn’t pan out and the sponsorships just weren’t there. That doesn’t mean we won’t try to host it here or somewhere else next year.”
SHARED PERFORMANCES
Auckland: Marcel Granollers and Tommy Robredo beat Johan Brunstrom and Stephen Huss 6-4 7-6 (6)
Hobart: Sara Errani and Roberta Vinci beat Kateryna Bondarenko and Liga Dekmeijere 6-3 7-5
Sydney (men): Lukas Dlouhy and Paul Hanley beat Bob Bryan and Mike Bryan 6-7 (6) 6-3 10-5 (match tiebreak)
Sydney (women): Iveta Benesova and Barbora Zahlavova Strycova beat Kveta Peschke and Katarina Srebotnik 4-6 6-4 10-7 (match tiebreak)
SITES TO SURF
Melbourne: www.australianopen.com/en_AU/index.html
ITF: www.itftennis.com/
Tennis Australia: www.tennis.com.au/
Heilbronn: www.heilbronn-open.de/
David Ferrer: http://davidferrer.com/
Novak Djokovic: www.novak-djokovic.com
Robin Soderling: http://robinsoderling.se/
Andy Murray: www.andymurray.com
Vera Zvonareva: www.zvonareva.ru/
Samantha Stosur: http://samstosur.com/
Caroline Wozniacki: www.carolinewozniacki.dk/
Venus Williams: www.venuswilliams.com/
TOURNAMENTS THIS WEEK
(All money in USD)
MEN AND WOMEN
Australian Open, Melbourne, Australia, hard (first week)
TOURNAMENTS NEXT WEEK
MEN AND WOMEN
Australian Open, Melbourne, Australia, hard (second week)
MEN
$113,000 Heilbronn Open, Heilbronn, Germany, hard
