Wednesday, September 16, 2009
BUSINESS NEWS
Agents Are Competing to Represent New British Star
Heather Watson, Britain’s new US Open junior champion, has become one of the hottest properties in tennis with management big guns IMG and Octagon both vying to represent the 17 year-old from Guernsey.
For the moment Watson, whose current Sony Ericsson WTA Tour world ranking stands at a career high 741, plays as an amateur because she was seriously considering the possibility of a tennis scholarship at an American university. However the professional ranks now seem to beckon for the girl who is sponsored by the on-line gambling company Sporting.Bet.com.
IMG would appear to be in pole position to sign her to their list of promising youngsters as she is currently in her sixth year at the IMG/Bollettieri Academy in Bradenton, Florida and Olivier Van Lindonk, who manages several young players based at the academy such including Kei Nishikori, is canvassing for Watson’s business.
But in London Octagon’s Abigail Tordoff is also well aware of the situation. However the company need to sort out whether there would be a conflict of interests as they already manage Britain’s other promising female junior Laura Robson who was a semi-finalist in the junior singles at New York.
Watson’s father Ian, the managing director of the Guernsey Electricity Board, guards the business side of his daughter’s career and is known to be seeking the best and most sensible deal.
Meanwhile Nigel Sears, Head of Women’s Tennis at Britain’s Lawn Tennis Association, has compared Watson’s game to that of former world no.1 Martina Hingis. Seeded 11 at Flushing Meadows, she claimed her title with a 6-4 6-1 victory over Russia's Yana Buchina after previously beating the reigning ITF World Junior Champion and this summer’s Wimbledon junior singles winner Noppawan Lertcheewakarn of Thailand.
“Heather is a well-balanced player who anticipates well, has great footwork and instinct for the game,” enthused Sears. “She's a very complete, all-round player. I'm so pleased for her because she's been a good player for a while.
"This win - and the $10,000 women’s event she won in the summer at Frinton in England will really help her to believe that she has so much more success to come."
Mindful of the fact Hingis had won four full Grand Slam singles titles by the time she was 17, Sears continued: “Heather reminds me of Martina Hingis at that age."
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Serena Apology? Or Publicity Stunt?
The idea of Serena Williams appearing on Good Morning America after the US Open finally came to an end was supposedly designed to allow her to apologize for her on-court meltdown at a line judge. Instead it just turned out to be a publicity stunt for her newly released autobiography On The Line and Serena admitted she was rapidly penning a new chapter on the notorious incident that ended her semi-final demise against Kim Clijsters.
Serena spent much of her slot telling host Chris Cuomo about her book before finally showing some signs of contrition. She maintained she has received an outpouring of support via e-mail, though the true test of how this affects her image figures to play out over weeks and months, not days.
“I think the whole point of learning from your mistakes is not to do the same thing,” she said. “I definitely would, I think, I have a more professional way of voicing my opinion. I want to get another bad line call, so I can get some more practice and see how I do.”
The matter is far from resolved as far as the Grand Slam Committee is concerned and there will be a concerted study of all available television tapes to ascertain as much evidence as possible on the incident. It is not beyond the bounds of possibility that Serena could be suspended from defending her Australian Open singles title in January.
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The Third Set of Men’s Finals Was a Key
Even though Roger Federer won third set of US Open final, Franco Davin, Juan Martin Del Potro’s coach, says that was the part of the match when he became convinced that his pupil will win.
“The score was 4-3, Federer was not serving that good any more; his level of game was dropping. He couldn’t harm Delpo that much; Juan grew more and more confident. Juan broke his serve and I thought that he will dominate to the end. But when Roger won that set, thing got more complicated. Winning fourth set was clear sign that Juan will win fast.”
Davin who worked with Gaston Gaudio when he made biggest surprise of this decade winning Roland Garros in 2004, admits that beginning was not that promising.
“Federer started very well, I was afraid that it may be quick final, but Juan drew experience from previous matches against him”, explained the Argentine coach. Though Delpo never beat Federer in six matches, he knew what to do.
“We spoke a lot before final. He told me that he couldn’t sleep a lot after the Nadal win. I explained to him that that was logical; that happens to everyone. I told him that Sampras once said that everybody is nervous before big matches; but the best is he who manages nerves best. Juan will play more finals, but this one was unique.”
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Bollettieri Offers to Help the British LTA
Britain’s Guardian newspaper has revealed that Nick Bollettieri has offered to help the Lawn Tennis Association in their quest for success.
It has not gone unnoticed - far from it - that several of the decent players that Britain has produced have honed their craft with little help from the LTA. Tim Henman made it outside ‘the system’, and he has been followed by Andy Murray (who moved to Spain), and now Heather Watson, who last weekend became the first British girl to win the junior title at the US Open. She has been learning the game at Bollettieri’s academy in Florida.
"What we're hoping is that Roger Draper (chief executive of the LTA) and Performance England bring some of their coaches and players over to us and learn from where Heather is,” said Bollettieri, who is now planning to give hands-on help to Watson. “We think she can be a role model for your country, and your country could do with some more top girls right now."
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Molik is Returning to the Tour Slowly
Alicia Molik is re-starting her singles career from scratch at a modest $25,000 event in Darwin this week after an elbow injury forced her into retirement a year ago. But she didn’t think she would be playing again after walking away from the game for a second time.
Her original departure was caused by an inner-ear virus that derailed her at the height of her career, soon after she had climbed to eight in the world, and when she returned from that setback a number of injuries slowed her progress and led to a second retirement. Now, having experienced a couple of doubles outings in the US, she is ready to take to the singles court again.
“Sometimes time-off is a great mender,” she told Melbourne’s The Age. “I stayed fit, played squash instead, just did enough to keep my mind off playing tennis. I never thought I'd pick up a tennis racquet again. At that stage I'd played on the tour 10 years and I probably just thought, 'My time's up', because it's no fun coming back from injury all the time. But from February-March I was doing a bit of coaching and hitting and not feeling pain, and just loving and enjoying playing.”
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US Open Sets Attendance Record
The 2009 US Open set an attendance record with 721,059 spectators, beating the 720,227 that attended last year, when the tournament also ran over into a 15th day. The event also set a Week 1 attendance record of 423,427, including a single-day high of 61,554 for the combined day and night sessions on the first Friday.
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Clijsters Qualifies to Play for Billie Jean King Cup
With her win at this year’s US Open, Kim Clijsters has qualified for an invitation to the 2010 BNP Paribas Showdown for the Billie Jean King Cup. Pending her acceptance, Clijsters will join Serena Williams (Australian Open/Wimbledon) and Svetlana Kuznetsova (French Open), who have already qualified. The fourth player will be named in the next several weeks and will come from a list of former Grand Slam winners or world No. 1 players.
The BNP Paribas Showdown on March 1, which is part of “Tennis Night in America,” will bring together the 2009 Women’s Grand Slam winners or world No. 1 players, vying for $1.2 million in prize money and the Billie Jean King Cup.
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Daniel Nestor Charity Event Raises over $100,000 for NYGH and Tennis Canada
Daniel Nestor and Rogers Cup Tournament Director Karl Hale collaborated again for another banner charity event in Toronto for the benefit of North York General Hospital and Tennis Canada. The 7th Annual Daniel Nestor Charity Event was held September 12, where 200 guests attended the gala dinner performed by world renowned chef Susur Lee held at the exclusive Donalda Club.
Over the weekend 150 juniors played in the junior tournament, and 300 people attended the exhibition between Daniel Nestor/Karl Hale vs. Fred Niemeyer/Bruno Agostinelli. Over $100,000 was raised from the event bringing the total raised over the past 7 years to over $700,000.
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We Hear---
--that moves are afoot among European tournament directors to nominate a new candidate to challenge Monte Carlo’s tournament director Zelko Franulovic for his place as a tournament representative on the ATP World Tour’s board of directors. Franulovic’s three year term comes to an end on January 1 next year.
--that US Open champion Juan Martin Del Potro was so weary after following his five set win over Roger Federer with all night partying in the Manhattan nightspot Avenue on the Upper West Side that he admitted: “I don’t want to play for a while. I need the rest.”
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THIS WEEK
MEN
Davis Cup Semifinals
WOMEN
Guangzhou
Quebec City
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NEXT WEEK
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Bucharest
Metz
WOMEN
Seoul
Tashkent
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