Teams line up for World Doubles finals

Teams line up for World Doubles finals

JAKARTA (JP): New teams come to blows with old as the race
begins for the eight spots in the US$1.3 million ATP World
Doubles Championship here in November.

The American-Australian pairing of Trevor Kronemann and David
Machperson sound a note of warning to the established teams when
they won their second tour title in the Japan Open two weeks ago
for a surprising fourth place in the latest ATP World Doubles
rankings, issued on Monday.

"We didn't expect to win because there are so many good teams
on the tour," Machperson said after his victory in Tokyo. "Our
goal is to qualify for Jakarta but it is too early to speculate,"
he added.

Jakarta will host the year-end tournament for the second
successive year at the Senayan indoor tennis stadium.

The Canadian-American partnership of Grant Connell and Patrick
Galbraith, two-time Wimbledon runners-up, set the pace in the
early race, as it did in the last two seasons, after grabbing
three titles. Connell brought his doubles victories to four when
he won the XL Bermuda Open with American Todd Martin last week.

Connell and Galbraith, who finished as world number one team
in 1992, lost to the Dutch duo of Paul Haarhuis and Jacco Eltingh
in last year's World Doubles semifinals.

Coming a close second are the American Davis Cup team and
Australian Open winners Jared Palmer and Richey Reneberg. Palmer
narrowly missed making last year's championship with then partner
Patrick McEnroe.

Wimbledon champions and two-time World Doubles runners-up Todd
Woodbridge and Mark Woodforde are trailing in third place,
followed by the Canadian-Bahama doubles of Daniel Nestor and Mark
Knowles. Eltingh and Haarhuis, who won the Philadelphia Open for
their first title of the year last February, are fifth.

Defending champions Jonas Bjorkman and Jan Appell remain well
out of the spotlight. Making their second semifinal appearance of
the year in last week's Hong Kong Open, the Swedish Davis Cup
heroes languish at 30th place. The two also staged an all-Swede
singles semifinal in Hong Kong last week.

The teams will have further opportunities to move ahead in the
rankings this week as the ATP Tour moves on to Monte Carlo and
Seoul. (amd)