TENNIS in DEPTH.

Jelena Jankovic was pushed to the limit in her openening match by French rising star Aravane Rezai, eventually winning in three sets 3-6, 6-4, 7-5.

Shahar Peer of Israel has beaten Virginie Razzano of France 6-2, 6-2 in the second round of the Dubai Tennis Championship.

Peer, at No. 22 in the world, is ranked two places higher than Razzano. Peer won 77 percent of the points on her first serve to even their head-to-head record at 2-all.

She will next play top-seeded Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark, who defeated Dominika Cibulkova of Slovakia 6-2, 7-6 (2).

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For 90 minutes on Sunday, tennis’ biggest stars used their last pre-Australian Open hitouts to help a good cause.

Nine players led by men’s and women’s world No.1s Roger Federer and Serena Williams took to Rod Laver Arena on Sunday for a teams’ exhibition match to raise money for those affected by the devastating Haiti earthquake.

The initiative, kick-started by Federer and pulled together by Tennis Australia within 24 hours, helped raise more than $200,000 as tennis fans and players rallied to make the event a huge success.

Fans queued for up to five hours to buy all 15,000 $10 tickets for a 90-minute match played with plenty of trick shots and a wonderful sense of humour.

Andy Roddick – foot-faulted by a linesman during the match – provided the comic highlight by threatening to send Williams in to seek retribution along the lines of her US Open outburst.

Williams took the joke in good spirits, and laughed her way through several games of mixed doubles across the net from perhaps her main rival for the women’s singles title, Kim Clijsters.

Australians Lleyton Hewitt, Samantha Stosur and late ring-in Bernard Tomic all gave up valuable practice time to take part.

As tins rattled around the packed stadium collecting donations, men’s stars Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic clowned around with Federer – who in a few hours would be the enemy standing in the way of their title aspirations.

“We rarely see exhibition matches on a relaxed basis but when the top guys come together and we know we have a rough two weeks ahead of ourselves, it’s more about the talking and the touch and the interaction with the crowd,” Federer said.

“It was a lot of fun. It’s a great thing and I’m happy the players were also in such good spirits.”

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Top-ranked Serena Williams advanced to the semifinals at the Sydney International with a 6-2, 6-2 win over Vera Dushevina of Russia on Wednesday.

Williams, playing her only warmup tournament ahead of her attempted title defense at the Australian Open, next plays France’s Aravane Rezai, who had a 6-3, 6-0 win over Italian Flavia Pennetta.

She said the strong breeze was a relief after a hot opening win here, although experiencing both conditions was a good test before the season’s first major starts Monday at Melbourne Park.

“It was really windy out there, but it’s good to have a good result in the wind,” she said. “I definitely don’t think I played my best, but that’s comforting to know that today wasn’t my best.”

No. 2 Dinara Safina was no match for Olympic gold medalist Elena Dementieva, as she lost 6-2, 6-3. Dementieva  will meet sixth-seeded Victoria Azarenka, who advanced 2-6, 6-2, 7-5 over Slovakia’s Dominika Cibulkova.

On the men’s side, Lleyton Hewitt started his bid for a fifth Sydney title with a 6-0, 6-2 win over Italian Andreas Seppi, reaching the quarterfinals with one 55-minute victory.

Former top-ranked Hewitt won six straight games, then overcame an early service break in the second set and won six straight games to finish when Seppi double-faulted at match point.

Fourth-seeded Hewitt, a former U.S. Open and Wimbledon champion, evened his career head-to-head matchups at 2-all with Seppi.

“I’ve had match points against him and ended up losing – that scoreline today looks a lot better,” Hewitt said.

Hewitt next plays 2006 Australian Open finalist Marcos Baghdatis, who ousted sixth-seeded Viktor Troicki of Serbia 7-5, 6-3.

Another Australian advanced to the quarterfinals when Peter Luczak had an upset 1-6, 6-4, 6-2 win over second-seeded Tomas Berdych of the Czech Republic.

Also advancing were Frenchmen Julien Benneteau and Richard Gasquet – who beat eighth-seeded Benjamin Becker of Germany 6-2, 7-6 (4) – and American Mardy Fish, a 6-1, 6-2 winner over Russia’s Evgency Korolev.

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GREAT Britain, Russia and Kazakhstan are all a chance of earning the right to play Spain in the Hyundai Hopman Cup XXII Final coming into Session 10’s double-header.

On Centre Court, Great Britain’s Laura Robson and Andy Murray can book their place with a win over Russia’s Elena Dementieva and Igor Andreev.

However, a Russian win would send the cat amongst the pigeons leaving the Russians and Brits to battle out via calculations, and Kazakhstan’s Yaroslava Shvedova and Andrey Golubev could join them in the mix with a win over the out of contention German team of Sabine Lisicki and Philipp Kohlschreiber.

Following Wednesday night’s game it would appear that Great Britain will beat Russia. On Wednesday night Russia lost to Asian Hopman Cup winners Kazakhstan 1-2 in the Tie, but with a team of world No. 5 Elena Dementieva and No. 35 Igor Andreev, the second-seed Russians will be keen to keep alive its Final hopes.

Great Britain has yet to lose a Tie with Murray winning all his singles and then the mixed doubles with youngster Laura Robson. The two will be playing on Centre Court while Germany and Kazakhstan will be on Court 1.

Robson is looking forward to her match against Russian sensation Dementieva and the 15-year-old is confident she can play better tennis this year.

“Well I can still improve on everything. The match was a lot better than on Monday,” Robson said.

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Andy Roddick’s troublesome knee was given a stern test but the big-serving American came through with flying colours in his return to the ATP tour on Monday night.

Australian Davis Cup regular Peter Luczak gave Roddick a worrying first-set scare before the top seed prevailed 7-6(5) 6-1 in his opening match at the Brisbane International.

Luczak, who has worked his way to No.77 in the rankings after an injury-hit 2009, was up 5-3 in the tense tiebreak but failed to close out the set by dropping clutch points on serve.

Roddick swiftly grabbed the opportunity given by two unforced Luczak errors and then quickly ran through the second set with his signature booming serve firing on all cylinders.

The world No.7 iced the first set with an ace, one of an amazing 15 for the match, with his weapon hitting speeds beyond 220 km/h.

Roddick finished 2009 early to rest his knee but after three months rest he moved as well as ever during his one hour and 23 minutes at Pat Rafter Arena.

Defending champion Radek Stepanek used all his smarts to work out and then work over local John Millman on Monday night to maintain his unbeaten record at the Brisbane International.

The crafty Czech took just over an hour to dispose of Millman 6-4 6-0 on Pat Rafter Arena to set up a possible second round clash with another Queenslander, Bernard Tomic.

Brisbane baseline slugger Millman was an instant crowd favourite and rose to the occasion in the opening set when he went shot for shot with the world No.12.

His first faltering step came in the eighth game as Stepanek broke to take a 5-3 lead and serve for the set.

But to Millman’s credit he immediately broke back to the delight of the parochial crowd, which regularly chanted for the 20 year old.

He was set to defy his world ranking of 307 and level at 5-all when 40-15 up on serve but consecutive double faults gave the Czech his chance.

Stepanek grabbed it with both hands to take the set and the wind went from the popular local’s sails as he lost the next seven games in his ATP tour debut.

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Whether you are a fan of Tiger Woods or not, or whether you simply dismiss his behaviour as predictably expected, it will be interesting to measure the impact his ‘indefinite’ absence from the game will have on golf. When he was out having surgery in the summer the TV ratings dropped 50%, the sales of golf equipment, club memberships and tuition plummeted around the world. To put a value on his presence at the Major tournaments and his value to golf in general is impossible, but it is obviously huge.

Does Roger Federer have a similar impact on tennis? If he retired from the ATP Tour would the tour collapse? Would a prolonged absence due to injury deplete the attendance at Wimbledon or the US Open? The answer is No!

Did Nadal’s absence for four months have a negative effect on the game? No! Did the WTA’s receipts decline because Sharapova was out for almost a year? No!

Tennis fans in general are more tuned-in to the game rather than to the personalities of the players. Tennis is more about ’sport’ than ‘entertainment’.

One of the major reasons that tennis’s scandals have been limited to a couple of failed drug tests, a betting fiasco, and a tirade of expletives from several players, and nothing worse, is because with only a few exceptions, tennis players are single. Who sleeps with who, if you’re single, is fine. Sure, we all like to know the details, but there are no moral issues involved.

So Messrs Federer, Roddick,and Davydenko we will all be watching your every move!

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Nadal had the important role of being Spain’s cheerleader-in-chief at Barcelona’s Palau Sant Jordi, with the world No 2 loudly celebrating every point that Fernando Verdasco and Feliciano Lopez won on the way to defeating Radek Stepanek and Tomas Berdych in the Davis Cup final, meaning the home nation retained the trophy they won in Argentina last season.

All four of Spain’s Davis Cup successes have come during the Noughties. It was here in this stadium, in 2000, that Spain won the Davis Cup for the first time. On that occasion, Nadal’s involvement was to carry Spain’s flag during the on-court ceremonies. And the Spanish keep on winning ‘La Ensaladera’, their affectionate name for the salad bowl-shaped trophy.

If the grand slam nations of Great Britain, the United States, France and Australia dominated this team competition during the twentieth century, there can be little doubt which country has been the superpower in the opening decade of the twenty-first century.

Spain needed just two days of the three-day tie here on the Montjuic Hill to become the first country since Sweden in 1998 to successfully defend the trophy.

While Nadal had some difficulties in the middle of the season, when he had his first defeat at the French Open and he had to withdraw from Wimbledon because of injury, the beginning and end of his year have been successful.

At Melbourne Park in February, Nadal beat Roger Federer in the Australian Open final to win his first hard-court grand slam title, and now this in December.

Nadal had done his bit on the clay when he demolished Berdych in the opening singles rubber on Friday afternoon, and yesterday he watched as Verdasco and Lopez saved one set point in the opening set tiebreak, and then went on to achieve a 7-6, 7-5, 6-2 victory.

Between points, the only man who was getting more attention from the television cameras than Nadal was Spain’s Crown Prince Felipe.

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