Fifth doubles qualify for World Doubles final

Fifth doubles qualify for World Doubles final

JAKARTA (JP): Russian Andrei Olhovsky and his Australian
partner David Adams have assured themselves of tickets to the
Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) World Doubles
championship final here next month.

Olhovsky and Adams became the fifth doubles to qualify for the
Nov. 23-30 season-ending tournament after reaching the finals at
the Salem Open in Beijing last week. The pair, seeded number one,
lost to the new combination of Tommy Ho and Kent Kinnear 6-7 (7-
9), 3-6, but raised their point ranking to 2,047.

The ATP fifth ranked duo, who will make their second
appearance at the World Doubles final, join the Dutch world
number one team, Paul Haarhuis and Jacco Eltingh, the "Woodies",
Australia's Todd Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde, newcomers Byron
Black of South Africa and Jonathan Stark of the U.S. and the 1993
world's top pair Grant Connell and Patrick Galbraith to fill the
line up for world's elite group of eight.

With just three weeks remaining, seven pairs are chasing the
last three spots. Four of the seven teams in contention for the
spots are playing in the Stockholm Open, which gets underway this
week.

Top Swedish doubles Jan Apell and Jonas Bjorkman, currently
number six, remain the leading contenders for the sixth
qualifying spot with 1,796 points.

The eight teams will be vying for the winner's point ranking
of 640 and a whopping US$225,000 top prize money. This year's
number one pair will also earn $180,000 in cash bonuses.

The qualifying teams will be divided into two groups of four
teams. They will play round-robin matches, with the two top pairs
advancing to the cross-over semifinals.

ATP has set the first group to be made up of the number one,
four, five and eight teams in the world according to ATP rankings
on Nov. 14. The other division groups world number two, three,
six and seven.

Indonesia has been named host for the World Doubles final for
two successive editions in place of South Africa, the host for
the previous 10 finals, because of political stability reasons.
Indonesia will tentatively extend the contract with ATP for
another three years.

Fahmi Alatas of TPI (Televisi Pendidikan Indonesia), the
private television station which holds the broadcasting rights,
said yesterday 700 million people from 80 countries will watch
the year-end tournament through 40 TV stations overseas.

"We will not take a broadcasting fee from foreign stations in
the first two years. We will consider doing that if we extend the
deal for the next three years," Fahmi said.

The contract, signed by TPI and ATP, is worth US$1.75 million
per annum for the first two years. This amount will increase if
both parties agree to the next three-year deal. (amd)