TENNIS in DEPTH.

Jess Moore, Rennae Stubbs, Jelena Dokic and Sam Stosur.

Tickets for the Australia versus Spain Fed Cup clash go on sale on Monday 21 December.

To be held at Memorial Drive Tennis Centre from 6 to7 February 2010, the Fed Cup by BNP Paribas 2010 World Group II tie is likely to showcase Samantha Stosur and Jelena Dokic.

Event Director Steve Ayles expects a terrific atmosphere in Adelaide.

“This tie will provide a spectacular opportunity for Adelaide tennis fans, as well as interstate and international fans, to see some great women’s tennis,” Ayles said.

“Victory would mean the Australian team is one tie away from the 2011 World Group I and the top eight Fed Cup teams in the world.

“Adelaide has had extensive experience running world-class events, such as the ATP Australian Men’s Hard Court Tennis Championships as well as past Davis and Fed Cup ties and is the perfect location for the Optus Australian Fed Cup Team to take on Spain next year.”

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The ATP Tour will return to Atlanta next season after the series purchased the sanctioning rights from the event in Indianapolis.

The ATP board last month voted to buy the Indianapolis sanction under rules which allowed the ATP to match any offer made for the event.

The hard-court tournament in Atlanta will be held over the week of July 17-25 2010 and marks the first time an ATP Tour event has been held in the US city for nine years.

Mark Young, ATP chief executive officer for the Americas, said: “This is a great win for the parties involved and is a wonderful example of co-operation and understanding between different authorities in tennis coming together to achieve the common goal of promoting and developing tennis in the United States.

“We at the ATP wish the tournament every success and are delighted we could find a way to work with the USTA to achieve this outcome.”

The host club for the hard-court tournament, to be held from July 17-25, is yet to be determined, though a decision is expected by mid-January ahead of ticket sales.

The first stop on the US Open Series – dubbed ‘the greatest roadtrip in sport’ by marketeers – starts two weeks after the European clay and grass court seasons end, and has traditionally struggled to attract European players capitalising on extra time around their local training bases.

But Oakes said he has already heard from the agents of two top-10 players. Robby Ginepri, this year’s champion at the Indianapolis event, is expected to ‘defend his title’ in Atlanta.

“This is two weeks after Wimbledon, so normally the top Europeans haven’t come over yet,” said Rex Maynard, president of USTA Southern. “What we’d hope to be able to attract would be the top American players, maybe the South American players.”

Previous winners from the Atlanta tournament, in its many guises, include Andy Roddick in 2001, Pete Sampras in 1998, Andre Agassi in 1989, 1991, and 1992 and John McEnroe in 1985.

There will be a 32-player draw in singles and a 16-team draw in doubles.

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Richard Gasquet has been cleared of doping by the Court of Arbitration for Sport, which dismissed appeals by sports authorities for a tougher penalty after the French tennis player tested positive for cocaine in March.

Gasquet, a former top 10 player and a Wimbledon semi-finalist, failed the original test at the Miami Masters.

The 23 year-old said traces of the drug entered his system via a woman – known only as ‘Pamela’ – who he kissed in a Miami club.

International sport’s top court acknowledged that Gasquet was likely to have been inadvertently contaminated with a minute trace of cocaine when he kissed the woman.

“The player has been exonerated from any fault or negligence and the CAS has dismissed the appeals filed by the ITF (International Tennis Federation) and WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency),” the court said in a statement.

Gasquet was provisionally suspended in May before serving a two-and-a-half month retroactive ban.

The ITF and WADA wanted him to be hit with a ban of one or two years.

The Lausanne-based court’s arbitrators said that a doping offence was correctly reported because of the presence of a “minusucle” quantity of cocaine in Gasquet’s urine sample.

However, they upheld Gasquet’s contention that he was contaminated through kissing and concluded that he could not be blamed.

“On a balance of probability, the CAS panel concluded that it was more likely than not that the player’s contamination with cocaine resulted, as Gasquet always asserted, from kissing a woman in a nightclub in Miami on the day before the anti-doping test.

“It was impossible for the player, even when exercising the utmost caution, to know that in kissing a woman who he had met in a totally unsuspicious environment, he could be contaminated with cocaine,” the statement added.

The CAS found that Gasquet “had met the required standards of proof with respect to the way of ingestion.”

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Now that I am back from Barbados, I thought you might like to hear about my trip. I spent 10 days there with my parents and my brother Patrick. We stayed at one of the most exclusive and beautiful resorts of the world, the Sandy Lane Hotel. We had the owner’s 5-bedroom penthouse suite with a butler and full time security. The suite was over 3000 square-feet, with a big jacuzzi in the living room. It was nothing short of amazing. The Sandy Lane Hotel has to be the nicest, most excusive hotel I have ever stayed at.

As I have mentioned in my last blog entry, I was in Barbados to play a one-weekend exhibition with my friend, Serena Williams. I have to admit, it went incredibly well; I was impressed with the job the promoter, Kodi Lewis and his team has done. They organized the exhibition for the 1st time, and I think this was the best 1st exhibition I ever participated in.

Serena and I had a great time; we played in front of 4000 people in the main gym in Bridgetown on Saturday. The crowd was loud and I could tell that they were really excited to have Serena and myself there, which I am grateful for.

I am glad I got to spend some time with Serena not only this past weekend, but over the past few years; and might add that we became pretty close friends. I have so much respect for her and what she has accomplished in her already legendary career. All young tennis players, including myself, owe a great deal to Venus and Serena for doing such a wonderful job promoting not only women’s tennis but women’s sports in general.

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Rising tennis teen Bernard Tomic will finetune for the Australian Open by playing at the World Tennis Challenge.

Tomic, 17, has agreed to play in the novel World Tennis Challenge in Adelaide next January.

The Adelaide tournament, in which a retired star partners a current player in a teams format, ends only four days before the Australian Open starts in Melbourne.

Tomic will partner Wimbledon champ Pat Cash, who at age 44 is 27 years his senior.

The Tomic–Cash combination will represent Australasia in the Adelaide event, opposed to three teams – the Americas, Europe and the Internationals.

The Americas team features 50-year-old John McEnroe and Robbie Ginepri while French 46-year-old Henri Leconte will play for Europe with an as yet un-named teammate.

World No.14 Radek Stepanek will head the Internationals with a yet to be announced retired player.

Tomic this year became the youngest player in the Open era to win a main draw match at the Australian Open.

Currently ranked 286 in the world, Tomic expects to be given a wildcard into next year’s Australian Open.

“I can’t wait to play in Adelaide … playing alongside some of the greats will be a great learning curve,” he said in a statement on Tuesday.

“WTC is a fantastic concept and I think it will be great to play with Pat alongside some of the legends of the game.

“I think Adelaide is ideal preparation for the Australian Open.”

The WTC, first held earlier this year, will be held at Adelaide’s Memorial Drive from January 12 to 14.

The format pits the two current players against each other, followed by the past players. The teams then join for a doubles match.

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Last month on a national television sports show, President Michelle Bachelet said she felt it important that Gonzalez, ranked 11th in the world, play for Chile’s Davis Cup tennis team (ST. Nov 2). Gonzalez responded by thanking the President and agreeing to meet with her to discuss his problems with Chile’s tennis federation.

Gonzalez defended the length of time it had taken for him to respond to Bachelet’s offer, insisting that he hadn’t been able to think about it until the tennis season ended earlier this month.

The tennis star quit the Davis Cup team in April after the FTCh published details of how much he and fellow team members Nicolas Massu and Paul Capdeville were paid. Since then Gonzalez has publicly feuded with FTCh director Jose Hinzpeter.

Hinzpeter hailed Gonzalez’s words as a “positive gesture.” “I hope we can heal the wounds and talk about Fernando returning,” he said.

A government spokesperson also praised Gonzalez’s comments, but insisted that a firm date for the meeting was yet to be agreed upon due to the President’s busy schedule and the player’s tournament commitments.

The Davis Cup competition pits the best tennis players from countries the world over in an international knockout format. Without Gonzalez, the Chilean team defeated Austria in September to maintain their position in the cup’s top division – the World Group (ST, 22 Sept).

Gonzalez’s statement raised hopes he will play in Chile’s first match of the 2010 tournament against Israel in the north Chilean port city of Coquimbo next march.

Gonzalez spoke while publicizing next Monday’s exhibition game against Argentine world number five and US open champion Juan Martin del Potro. The game starts at 22.00 at Santiago’s Moviestar arena and is seen by both players as an important warm-up ahead of next month’s Australian open.

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Elena Dementieva is all hyped up to celebrate the Yuletide season with family in Kuala Lumpur. The world No 5 will be in town to compete in the Showdown of Champions together with fellow Russian Maria Kirilenko, China’s Zheng Jie and Sania Mirza of India at the Malawati Stadium in Shah Alam over the weekend.

“I’m happy to celebrate Christmas with my family in KL. I’ve never been to Malaysia but I’ve read a lot about the country by surfing the Net and would like to experience the celebration in KL,” said Dementieva, 28.

As for the Showdown of Champions, billed as Asia versus Russia, Dementieva said: “It’s good preparation for 2010. My season next year starts with the Hopman Cup in Perth, Australia where I’ll partner Igor (Andreev).”

She will then travel to Sydney to defend her title at the Medibank International which starts on Jan 10. Among the other tournaments in which she will participate early next year include the Open GDF Suez in Paris (Feb 9) and the Dubai Championship (Feb 15).

This will be her third outing in Dubai after having won in 2008. Her string of events this year include winning titles in Auckland and Sydney in January, followed by another title in Toronto in August.

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Andy Roddick and Serena Williams hope to team up for the United States in mixed doubles when the event returns to the Olympics at the 2012 London Games.

Roddick, 27, the men’s world number seven, has had discussions with Williams, 28, the women’s number one.

And Roddick said on Twitter: “It’s confirmed! Serena and Andy teaming up for mixed doubles at 2012 games if they push the mixed doubles through.”

The tennis events at London 2012 will take place on Wimbledon’s grass courts.

The International Olympic Committe announced last week that mixed doubles would be introduced to the Olympic programme in time for 2012.

But Roddick and Serena could face competition to represent the US from doubles star Bob Bryan, who hopes to form a pairing with Serena’s elder sister Venus, 29.

Bryan, 31, who has won seven Grand Slam doubles titles, and six Grand Slam mixed doubles titles, said on Twitter: “It’s not confirmed yet but if Bob and Venus play in 2012 we’ll smoke Andy and Serena.”

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