Tennis body seeks world rankings boost

JAKARTA (JP): The Indonesian Tennis Association (Pelti) has made the world rankings of national players' its major agenda for the year, the association's Secretary-General Sugeng Sarjadi said.

Sugeng told a media conference on Friday that Pelti would hold 16 senior and 16 junior tournaments to give national talents a chance to improve their rankings.

"Staging competitions at home will not only allow us to save money, but to reach our goal of boosting the players' world rankings," he said.

Pelti, under new chairman Tanri Abeng, who is also State Minister for the Empowerment of State Enterprises, is looking for sponsors for the events, Sugeng said.

Prolonged economic recession has prevented Pelti from sending the nation's best players to many international events for almost a year.

Chief of Pelti's promotion and competition affairs Subronto Laras said the association would bring satellite and challenger tournaments back to the country after missing out for two years.

He said four men's and four women's satellite tournaments and two challenger events in the men's and women's categories would be on show this year. A satellite tournament offers US$15,000 in purse, while a challenger $25,000.

In the past, Indonesia also hosted richer tournaments, with prize money of more than $100,000.

Sugeng, also a renowned businessman, said the association intended to put 10 males and 10 females in the world's top 100. Rated 57 on the WTA computer, woman singles player Yayuk Basuki is the only Indonesian in this elite group. The Asian Games gold medalist has planned to hang up her racket after the Australian Open later this month.

In the absence of Yayuk, Indonesia's only hope for a successor is if Wynne Prakusya could improve from her ranking in the 200s.

Things are worse on the men's side, with only Andrian Raturandang maintaining his ranking in the 800s. His peers have already been excluded from the top 1,000 due to lack of competition.

Andrian, Febi Widiyanto, Hendri Susilo Pramono, Eddy Kusdaryanto, Bonit Wiryawan and Sulistyo Wibowo have been named to join a national selection for the Davis Cup Asia Oceania Group 2 playoff in Qatar next month.

National team director Benny Mailili boasted Friday that his squad would overcome their Middle East opponents, although he had not known on what kind of court the duel will be played.

"They (the opponents) only have one good player," Benny said. (yan)